


The Abduction of Regan Emmett

by IneffableWife



Series: Stories of Regan Emmett [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Abandoned Town, Abduction, Fiction, Gen, Giuseppe Andrews, Horror, Hurt, James Duval - Freeform, John Hensley, Kidnapping, Minor Rape, Original Character - Freeform, Originial Story, Other, Real people, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-09-27 21:47:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 15
Words: 34,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20414821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IneffableWife/pseuds/IneffableWife
Summary: What happens when 22 year old, Regan Emmett gets captured by two crazed men and gets dragged in the woods to a broken down old cabin?She starts falling in love with one of her captors, while her family and friends start a life long mission to find her, and rescue her.*SEQUEL OUT NOW; STOCKHOLM SWEET*





	1. A New Life

Thurmond, West Virginia was an absolute ghost town. Nothing good came from being there. Not many people pay attention to it on the map, and not even urban explorers felt the need to pass through it. Only a select few crazy individuals came to reside in the small, five home town, if you would even call it a town to begin with.

The homes were constructed in the early 1900s, some were beginning to break down and rust away, but a couple still looked in mint shape as if they had just been built. The first house belonged to, **John Dragan**, a railroad worker who constructed his two story wooden abode back in the earlier years of 1900. He passed away in 1988 and since then, his great grandchildren took it over, trying to reconstruct it back to its beautiful posture.

The second home belonged to **Marilyn Brown**, whose home was also built in 1900. Although Marilyn Brown’s name was already the center of the town, she wasn’t born until 1907, named after her elder mother who was the mayor of Thurmond when it was more populated. Marilyn was still alive, well over 100 years old and living all alone in her tiny wooden home not to be bothered by anyone else, but was always such a friendly face whenever she would show her face every once in a while.

The third home belonged to **Margaret Dalton**, whose home was built by her own two hands in 1920, when it was frowned upon for women to do hard labor, and she was almost arrested in 1921 for working under hard laboring laws as a pregnant woman. She lived alone and didn’t want the pressure of having anyone working for her when she was strong enough to work on her own, but just after building her home she suffered a miscarriage and carried out three suicide attempts before being placed in an asylum to live out the rest of her days, she passed away in the asylum from an unknown illness in 1955. Her home is now occupied by her grandchildren.

The fourth home, deep inside the woods away from the other homes, belonged to a couple, **Sid Childers** and **Margie Richmond**. Their home was constructed by Sid’s father in 1900, but wasn’t completed until 1905, when Sid was born. Him and his wife Margie had the perfect life, away from everyone else to they could live privately without being bothered or had the risks or being robbed, as people back in those days were at large for always robbing and getting into small town houses. In 1930 however, Sid and Margie’s house had burnt down from the second and third story, and took months to be replaced, and at the end of the renovating, Margie had fallen ill with cancer and passed away shortly after her diagnosis, leaving Sid in a state of despair. He moved from Thurmond never to be seen again, and left the house abandoned, never to be found.  
But reports have been made that two mysterious men had managed to find the home, and started reconstructing any broken down parts they could find, and illegally moved in, with no troubles at all, never showing their faces in the town, and no one knowing anything about them.

Lastly, and most importantly, the fifth home. It belonged to two families, none of which were related to one another. **John Bullock** and **Roger Armandtrout** lived on the second floor, while Amy and Douglas Littlepage lived on the first floor. The home was constructed in 1900, commonly rented out as a whitewater rafting holster. The Littlepage family often sold rafts to make some pocket money, which John and Roger crafted themselves. Both families got along quite well until it was learned that Margie and Douglas were having a nasty love affair which resulted in a brutal and twisted rivalry between the families. They separated themselves from one another and moved out of Thurmond forever, leaving the two story home to be abandoned until 2016, when a new girl arrived.

Regan Emmett moved into the John Bullock home in mid-2016, after a huge fight escalated in her old home in Atlanta, Georgia. She wanted to not only escape from her abusive home, but she wanted to escape the state of Georgia all together. She knew she was better off living alone, and being the anti-social person she was, she decided to find a place where she knew she wouldn’t get bothered. That’s when she found Thurmond. She scoped out the town, or whatever it was called these days, and knew it was perfect for her. It had an eerie feel to it, like it was taken over by demons and had a haunting background to it. Most of the people who lived here died, or had left it abandoned because of the bad things that happened in it. They left for a purpose, but Regan came here for a purpose. To get away from the negativity in her life, she couldn’t wait to make a new life for herself, to prove to everyone she was capable of living on her own. She was 22 years old and never lived by herself. She always had someone taking care of her, although her family didn’t mind. She was at one point incredibly close to her parents, her father was the chief of police and was very well known, therefore so was Regan. Her mother was a painter, a very successful one, who sold over millions of painting since her teenage years when she began. Regan had a sister, Sabrina, who was on her way to becoming a detective. She was older than Regan and much more educated, and was able to help her parents out when they needed it, something Regan longed for. She was tired of being the only person in the family with no lifelong goals. Her sister and her didn’t even get along, Sabrina had a good life, dreams and goals she accomplished, but was always jealous of Regan for getting her parents attention for not doing anything at all. She might have been book smart, but mostly, Regan was a bum. Regan and Sabrina often fought over their parent’s love, and Sabrina always wondered how her sister got away with sitting around doing nothing, and on the last night of Regan’s life in Georgia, Sabrina finally got through to their parents, and it was finally revealed that Regan was no longer allowed to sit around and do nothing.  
She couldn’t believe Sabrina would try sabotaging her life, when she wasn’t even living with them, she had her own home, a boyfriend, and a beautiful step daughter. A proper family, and she decided it was in her best interest to ruin Regan’s life, but Regan wasn’t having it. She stole her dad’s wallet and everything in it, and ran away, thus arriving in Thurmond, never to be seen again, it was her time to shine, and she was about to show her family what she was made of.  
When she arrived at her new home, she stood at the entrance for a moment taking in the new smells, it was nothing like Atlanta, it had a certain aroma to it that she fell in love with. Looking around at the other wooden homes, she felt like she was in Silent Hill. It was appealing to her to be in an almost abandoned ghost town, and it didn’t scare her at all. She was weird like that. She was always someone that people were freaked out about, she liked things most 22 year olds didn’t. She wasn’t accustoming to a normal life, and she liked it that way. This was her new way of living and she was damn okay with it, no matter what people had to say. She wasn’t a bum. She had dreams, it was only a matter of time before she put those dreams into full throttle.

She settled in to her new home, where most of the furniture from the former residents were still there. It was molded and disgusting and she knew she had to renovate, but with this new found feeling of being able to have her own home, it didn’t matter what the inside looked like, she was happy to renovate, and was happy to buy new furniture. She had it all, she even had a brand new car, which she bought as soon as she arrived in West Virginia.  
She knew she needed to go into the city to buy some personal things to live off of, such as food, hygiene products, whatever she could get her hands on. She knew she had to get as many things as she could before her father’s credit card was cancelled from her stealing it. She dropped everything but her purse onto the molded bed, and her car keys before sprinting off downstairs and out of the house, so she could get to the nearest town as quickly as possible, not wanting to do much on her first day in Thurmond, she just wanted to rest, it had been such a long journey, a sad and angry journey. She still hadn’t heard from her parents, or her sister, but why would she? She was somehow always in the wrong when it came to arguments, and never had a say in anything other than the fact she was wrong and they were right. It was a big choice to move away, and an even bigger choice to run away with someone else’s money without going to jail for it. It was a good thing she was in a secluded ghost town no one ever heard of.  
As she pulled off, she looked back to make sure she didn’t run into someone else’s mailbox, but as she was looking, she saw the house directly across from hers, the house that belonged to Marilyn Brown. She was sitting outside on her front porch drinking from small tea cup, and talking to two men, who were about middle aged and looked as though they hadn’t showered in weeks. They were talking and smiling with the old lady, maybe her caretakers? Of course she needed someone to look after her, living in a home by herself as a 100-year-old.  
Regan backed out, and was now in full view of them. Marilyn waved at Regan with a large smile, as the two men were looking at her with glowing eyes, as if they never saw a young woman before, one of the men’s faces was scarred, maybe from something or someone scratching him over and over, he had shoulder length hair the color of coal, and wore dark clothing. He looked like someone from an industrial group. He had this wicked grin on his face that gave Regan a weird sensation, not too much of a worried one, but more of a weirded out one, she looked over at the other man. He was a little shorter than the other, more cleaned up, his hair was buzzed and he had tattoos on his right arm, from a distance you could still tell how blue his eyes were, his head was tilted up with a cigarette dangling from his mouth, as he crossed his arms, he winked at Regan, a tingling feeling ran down her spine, as she drove off quickly, attempting to avoid any more eye contact.  
She made it to the main road, with that awkward encounter still echoing through her mind, were those the two men she heard all those rumors about? They didn’t seem too scary, at least from the description she was told, they seemed like two hobos living in the woods, who were helping an old woman get through the day, that didn’t seem so bad. She tried getting that off of her mind though, she was going to a city, Glen Jean, a more populated area but not as populated as some cities, if you could call Glen Jean a city at all. It was more of a small town, only 210 people lived there, but compared to some towns, where they hold over 8000, this was a ghost town too.  
Thankfully it was only a 20-minute drive, it felt quick too, listening to music and just driving without any thoughts made the drive go by a lot faster as well. She saw people walking on the sidewalk with their children, some were at the park playing and screaming with laughter, it reminded her of Atlanta, almost a surreal feeling that she wasn’t there anymore, but that wasn’t what she wanted to think about. She had an agenda, she tried not to look at anyone, she wasn’t good at talking to people, or meeting new people or even making friends, she just wanted to be alone, she looked around to see if there was a grocery store or a market, but couldn’t see it in eyes view, she knew she had to walk some to find a place to go into, with a flash. She folded her arms tightly within each other and looked up at the store signs, not paying attention to anything else. She felt like she had been doing nothing but walking for ages, and realized that maybe Glen Jean wasn’t the right town to enter after all. But she heard a female voice calling out from behind her, and then a tap on her shoulder. Regan jumped than squealed.

“Oh shit, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you.” In front of Regan was a beautiful blonde haired woman. She looked to be the same age as her. Her hair flowed from the wind and she was wearing a grey tank top and black skinny jeans with a dirty pair on converse, definitely something Regan would wear on a lazy day. She held her hand out for Regan to shake, but she hesitated. 

“I’m Ahniah. I’m a part of the town council. It’s my job to scout new faces here, and I’ve never seen you here before, you a new resident?” Ahniah looked genuinely interested in Regan, there was a never-ending smile on her face, and it was stunning.

“Um.. Yes, hi. Uh, I’m Regan. Sorry I didn’t mean to get.. startled like that. I’m not new here in this town, but I just moved to West Virginia, I live about 20 minutes down the road, thought I’d check to see if there were any markets around, but I’m having no luck.” Regan shook her hand gracefully but quickly let go. She was awkward like that. But she never took her eyes off of Ahniah, she seemed so nice. She needed a friendly face once in a while, to take her mind off the shitty things that happened in Atlanta.

“Oh than I’m glad I found you! I’ll take you to our market, I know it’s pretty confusing here, you’d think the markets would be right when you enter the town but no, it’s all in the back, clothing boutiques are in the front in case you need a new wardrobe. But I can see that’s not an issue, you look awesome.” Ahniah chuckled as she guided Regan to the nearby market.

“Thanks...”

They finally arrived at the market, it was small but it was still suitable for anyone’s needs, obviously for the amount of people living in the town it was up to par. Ahniah greeted some customers than turned her attention back to Regan.

“I won’t follow you, but I didn’t want to run some things by you when you come back out if that’s okay? I’ll wait out here, I HAVE to know about the mysterious Regan.” Ahniah winked, the same type of wink that guy gave her back in Thurmond. She didn’t think much of it however, she nodded and disappeared inside, trying to avoid everyone running into her, it was a small market, and dozens of people pushed their way past isles to get to what they needed to get.  
Regan only needed a couple things. Shampoo, conditioner, hair brush, toothbrush, things in that nature, and some food. Before she knew it she was done and hustled her way out of the store before more people came busting in like mad dogs.  
She looked around in search of Ahniah, and saw her on the corner street, in front of the sheriff station, talking to what looked like two policemen. Was Regan in trouble? She couldn’t help but wonder. Did her father find out where she was, and tip to the policemen that there was girl walking around with stolen cash? She had a knot in her stomach, but before she could sneak off, Ahniah waved her down. Regan rolled her eyes, always wondering why things like this happened to her.  
She paced herself slowly, making her way over to Ahniah and the two men who were eyeing her down good. Not again...

“Regan! That was fast. I want you to meet these two fine men right here.” Ahniah pointed to two very handsome police officers, who were all smiles.

“Regan this is Officer Duval and Officer Andrews.” She looked at the both and shook their hands firmly, not wanting to come off as shy or disrespectful.

“Hi Regan, no need to be scared we’re not here to arrest you. We love meeting new faces. Especially beautiful ones.” Officer Duval kissed her hand, but was pushed back by Officer Andrews.

“Stop, you fuckin’ idiot. No need to bamboozle someone like this, you’re always doing this!”

“Am not!”

“Ya fuckin’ are so shut it!” Officer Andrews looked back at Regan with an embarrassed look. “Sorry about that, he loves to flirt.” He gave a snarky side eye back to Duval who couldn’t help but laugh.

“They do this all the time don’t worry, it’s nothing you won’t get used to.” Ahniah patted Regan’s shoulder and sat next to Andrews before placing a kiss on his cheek.

“You can call me Giuseppe, and this is James.” Officer Andrews and James sarcastically bowed before bombarding her with questions. “Where are you coming from?” Giuseppe continued.

“I’m living in Thurmond.”

“What?” All three asked in different tones. Regan backed up.

“Why, Thurmond? It’s a fuckin’ ghost town, haven’t you heard the rumors?” James got off the brick wall he was leaning on and walked closer to Regan, who was starting to get nervous. “Apparently two crazies live there, their known for being a little stalker-ish…” James folded his arms, staring deep into Regan’s blue eyes.

“Leave her be, I’m sure she is brave enough to handle her own, right Regan?” Giuseppe side grinned before looking back and seeing someone in handcuffs being taken in. “Duty calls. James you better get the fuck outta here before you get in trouble for being here on your day off.”  
James nodded without looking away from Regan, he noticed there was something off about her, and knew he had to keep a close eye on her from here on out. Regan saw Ahniah and Giuseppe passionately kiss for what seemed like hours before he headed off inside to do his job. Ahniah walked over to them and sighed. “It’s getting late, curfew is soon, better get the intercom set. It was nice meeting you, Regan, I hope to see more of you soon, feel free to come say hi anytime.” Ahniah shook her hand once again before running off into the counsel office.

“You better get going, we have a curfew here and no one can be outside past 6:30.” James backed off and held his hand out for Regan to shake, but she didn’t take it, instead she smirked and walked off without so much of a goodbye. She was good like that, she loved playing hard to get and could see James showed interest, but she had none. But he also knew he’d see her again, even if he had to take a trip to Thurmond.

When Regan arrived back to her home, it was already dark out, you could barely see the homes, there were no light posts, just her small porch light, and the inside light of Marilyn’s. She noticed Marilyn was back inside and the two dirty men had left. She rushed inside and turned her lights on before plumping down on her bed and letting out the biggest sigh. Closing her eyes, she imagined life back in Atlanta, is this what she really wanted? Only one way to find out, she was going to tough this new life out for a few days and get her life on track, this was it. This was her time to be a real adult now. No parents, no family, just her.

Welcome to Thurmond, Regan.


	2. Dark Eyes

Regan awoke the next morning not realizing she had even fallen asleep. She didn’t have any dreams, it was just a pitch black nothingness overpowering her sleep, as if she was dead. At least that’s what it felt like. She looked around her, noticing she was sleeping on the dirty molded bed that she was supposed to get rid of, but never managed to. She was tired from her long journey, but didn’t think she would unwillingly pass out. It had taken her a minute to collect herself, and move from the bed. Her neck was stiff and her clothes were all contorted, she looked like a hot mess, as if she was gang banged by twenty different men. She felt like a disaster and immediately got up to take a shower.  
As she got in, she remembered the previous evening she had went into the next town over to buy some shampoo and conditioner. She opened up the caps and smelled the fruity scent that was given off, a pleasant smell that made her happy whenever she was feeling down. Green apples and Cherry blossom, her favorite smells. She stepped into the shower and let the cold water hit her back, she gasped at how cold it really was, but since it was a rundown home, there was no hot water, at least not for the time being, so she had to make do with what she had. She stood under the water until she got used to the cold and held herself tightly, arms wrapping around her stomach and clenching her eyes shut, and started sobbing uncontrollably. She tried being strong but something inside of her knew what she did was wrong, having this horrible pit in her stomach about stealing her father’s money and running away only because what they were saying about her were true. She had nothing going for her, she had no job, no money of her own, she was an adult being treated like a baby and she felt disgusted in herself. The first city she thought of, resided 4 people of which most were long gone and dead, except for an older woman who could die any minute and two hobo men living somewhere deep in the woods, only coming out once in a while, but never into the city. There were residents living in a couple houses but they were always done, grandchildren and great grandchildren bought the homes so they wouldn’t be demolished but they never claimed it to be their permanent residence. It reality, Regan was all alone, all because she couldn’t do anything on her own. She thought of how successful she could be if she turned out like her sister, Sabrina. A detective, whose sole purpose was to bring justice to people, to save people, to make people has a calmer sense of mind, but when it came to Regan, all Sabrina did was bring her down, and it worked.  
She tried stopping herself from getting too worked up, there wasn’t anything she could do to take it back, and she knew her father would never forgive her for the pain she’s caused her family. Running away was bad enough, stealing her own father’s wallet and money was worse. He took pride in everything he accomplished, all the money he worked hard for, gone… Regan’s anger took over, a side she hated showing, but it was a side many people knew too well. She was always one for making people pity her, but not anymore, she knew she couldn’t turn back time, she could now only make a proper future for herself. It was time to get a job.

She opened up her eyes again, the bright light from in the bathroom almost blinded her, from how long her eyes were closed, she looked out of the small window in her bathroom to catch the natural light, which wasn’t even as bright as the one in her bathroom. She saw the trees swaying in the wind and the tumbleweeds moving around in circles, getting caught on mailboxes and old shed doors. She looked over by the woods and noticed there was a pathway on the east side. It looked as though it had just recently been made and she assumed it had been made by the two men she saw the previous day. She wondered how often they really came around, she had heard rumors that they never come out of the woods, but she saw the with the old woman, being friendly and helping her move around when she needed guidance. So they couldn’t have been all that bad, or were they? As she began to look away, getting ready to turn the shower off, she saw from the corner of her eye a figure standing just below her window, maybe 15 feet away at most, it looked like a dark figure and she hesitated before looking, maybe it was just a mailbox, but as she looked over, her eyes widened. There he was, standing there, looking up at her window, which was half cracked and broken, and there were no blinds covering the inside, she was half exposed. He grinned at her with that same wicked smile he flashed before when they encountered one another. His eyes were sunk in like he hadn’t slept in weeks, his hair was in a clumped up mess, which he kept in a messy bun. He wore a black torn tank top this time with the same black ripped skinny jeans that he wore when she first saw him. It was the Gothic looking fellow, he kept staring at her with those dark eyes, like a black hole sucking you in to oblivion. She tried ducking but the fear had struck her, why was he staring at her while she was showering? Before she could move away from his sights, she saw the other guy as well, running up to him, trying to force him away from her home, but he wouldn’t budge, it took all of the other man’s force to pry him from where he was standing. Regan could hear him cussing the goth man out, telling him to back the fuck off and to leave her alone, as if he was talking to a baby who wouldn’t leave their parents alone for more than five minutes, but he finally managed to pull him off, without looking up at her himself, they had disappeared and she was left wondering what had just happened. She was shaking, and slowly slid herself down until she was curled up in a ball inside the bathtub. Was this what she had to look forward to? Being stalked by a crazy Gothic man and his rocker friend? She didn’t know what to do or how to handle this sort of thing, since she had never been through it. She once lived in a neighborhood where everyone was friendly, and never had any mean feelings towards anyone, it was once a peaceful time, but Regan knew moving into a ghost town had its downs, this happened to be one of them.  
She crawled her way out of the tub, not knowing whether or not someone else was watching her and she didn’t want to take any chances being seen. She threw on a robe and hustled her way into the bedroom, closing the curtains and leaving the lights off, the sun bringing in just enough light, so she could see what she was doing. She felt hunted, but Regan being the woman she was, wasn’t about to let anyone get in her way of why she came to Thurmond in the first place, to get away from the drama, and she wasn’t about to let some weird men stop her from living her life. She looked through her suitcase, trying to find something to wear. She found a cute black long sleeved shirt with a fine white collar, and her black ripped skinny jeans she had recently gotten for her birthday, along with her loafers. She looked at herself in the mirror, it was no wonder the goth man wanted her, she was probably everything he longed for in a woman, but she didn’t have much else to wear, and this was her everyday wardrobe. She threw her long light brown hair in a messy bun and walked downstairs into the kitchen to make breakfast. She had forgotten to eat the night before, being as tired as she was, she forgot to do a lot of things, but today was the day of making up for wasted time.  
She put in her earbuds and played some music to block out any other unwanted noises, and to take her mind off of what had happened just minutes before. She made pancakes and eggs and the smell of the food filled up the entire house, what an amazing smell it was, all these scents brought back memories she often felt sad about, even the smell of fucking pancakes made her sad. She put the spatula down and took a deep breath. The lyrics of the current song weren’t making it any better. She needed some fresh air, and decided maybe it was for the best to take a drive somewhere, instead of moping over pancakes. She took her car keys out of her purse and put her purse on the busted up love seat in what appeared to be the living room. She headed towards the front door when she saw a shadowy human like figure standing at her front door. She stood still for a moment, hoping it wasn’t the creepy man who was staring at her, but then shortly afterwards, a gentle knock echoed through the door. She ran over to her purse and took out a small pocketknife she kept in case of an emergency, she was hoping she would never have to use it, but in cases like this, she was grateful to be prepared. She slowly made her way over to the front door, and began turning the rusty knob. It was loud and creaked like it wanted the world to know it was being opened, she grunted and knew there was no turning back now, and just decided to fling it open, before stepping back a few paces. In front of her stood one of the two men, the rocker guy. He was facing the opposite direction, but she could tell it was him from the tattoos on his arms. He looked back when he realized she opened the door, another cigarette dangled from his mouth, but this time he took it out and threw it on the ground, wasting what was still a whole cigarette.

“Hi, you’re the new chick, right?” He started off strong, making Regan want to punch him in the throat for being too forward.  
“Maybe?”  
He chuckled before holding out his hand, they were dirty and looked like pure construction worker hands. “I wanted to properly introduce myself, I saw you yesterday pulling out, and thought I’d make myself known so you weren’t frightened of me. I’m John, and you are?”  
She folded her arms and refused to shake it hand, noticing that he grabbed another cigarette from his pack and lit it, not letting his sight go from her.

“Regan…”

“Gorgeous name, for a gorgeous girl…” He winked. “Tell me, Regan, you’re not shy are you? You look like the shy type.”

“No, I’m not shy, I just prefer to not be stalked by your friend is all.”

“Oh, Ogre? I’m sorry about him, yeah he um… Hasn’t really seen a woman in years, I think he forgot what a pretty girl looks like. He meant no harm, and no he isn’t mentally retarded, he just uh, likes looking at hot chicks.” John laughed as he puffed on his cancer stick, he looked like a man who smoked 5 packs a day but didn’t give a fuck about his health.

“Yeah well, thanks for pulling him away, it is common courtesy not to watch someone as their showering.” She huffed.

“Maybe you should invest in some blinds.” His eyes narrowed.

“I don’t think that is any of your concern! No respectable man stares at a woman while their taking a shower.”

“Okay, but was I lookin’?”

“I was referring to your friend…”  
John didn’t speak for a moment; it was an awkward silence that made Regan cringe. What was this man’s motive?

“Why did you decide to move to Thurmond? This is no place for a sweet girl like you.” John finally broke the silence; Regan could finally breathe again.

“Personal issues back at home, needed freedom, away from people.”

“Oh trust me, I get the freedom part, and the not wanting to be around people, but then again there are plenty of other places around the world, other than this fucking dump.” John looked concerned, weirdly enough. He started walking a little closer to Regan, now standing on the first step of her front porch. All she wanted to do was get in her car and drive, but she felt trapped.

“I like the mystery of this place.”

“Mystery? Isn’t no mystery, this is dangerous territory, you should probably leave, you never know what could happen when you least expect it…” John stepped back down from the step, and moved to the side, seeing that Regan wanted to leave. He didn’t stop her, she ignored his remark and headed to her car.

“Guess I’ll find out for myself won’t I?” Regan sarcastically smirked before getting into her car and driving off. Not even looking back or into the rear view mirror to see if they weren’t watching her go off. She wasn’t going to be intimidated by anyone, not John, not Ogre, his creepy friend. Not anyone. This was her time to live it up, her way. She was prepared to do whatever it took to show everyone she wasn’t the same little shy girl from Atlanta.

**WELCOME TO GLEN JEAN**

She made her way back into the little city, which was packed with children making their way to school, adults were making their way to work, she saw Ahniah greeting and waving goodbye to the kids who passed her. Regan tried parking as close as she could, attempting not to run over the kids and adults who didn’t give a shit to cut in front of her, Ahniah noticed her immediately and waved her down.

“Regan! You’re back!” Ahniah cut through people, hurrying her way over to Regan who wasn’t even out of her car yet. But Regan seeing a friendly face made her heard warm.

“Oh hey Ahniah! Good t’see ya.” Regan hopped out of her car and greeted Ahniah with a gracious hug. It was good to see a happy face around town, maybe she should have moved to Glen Jean instead.

“You as well, how’s it going? Sorry we had to cut our meeting short last night, we do have a curfew here, 6:30 is early but we had some things happen a few months ago that scared the town and since then I decided it was for the best everyone went to their homes before the sun goes down, makes them feel more protected.” Ahniah brushed her hair out of her face, the wind blew hard today.

“No worries… Oh, um I wanted to tell you something, it's kind of import-"

“Babe!” Regan was interrupted by a scream from none other than Officer Andrews himself. He ran up to Ahniah and kissed her hard, like he hadn’t seen her in years.

“Hi babe, you remember Regan, yes?”

“Of course! How’s it going, Ms… What’s your last name?”

“Emmett, but please you call just call me Regan.” She chuckled, as they shook hands once more, he gleamed with delight as he looked back at Ahniah.

“I got a call today about a murder, so I gotta go deal with that shit. Always on my days off do I get called in for drama like this.” Officer Andrews said that as if it were a joke, which stunned Regan. A murder? Aren’t policemen supposed to take those seriously.

“What happened this time?” Ahniah’s expression looked emotionless as well, what was going on?

“Some bullshit about a guy’s head getting chopped off by a machete, guess someone wasn’t having a good night, but the suspect disappeared, headed north from here. I gotta go trace him down.” Officer Andrews huffed out a raspy sigh and placed his hand on his forehead. “Headaches for fuckin’ days, lemme tell ya.” Officer Andrews gave a wave to Regan and darted off into his car, where more officers were waiting. Ahniah looked over at Regan, who was clearly confused.

“I know you’re thinking we don’t care, but honestly stuff like this happens more than you think.” Ahniah gently took Regan’s shoulder and started guiding her on a walk. “Glen Jean might be a peaceful community, but the towns guarding it, well not so much. Most towns are abandoned, but there have been a few murders in the last couple of months, men taking kids to the towns and killing them because no one is around to see it or hear it, and they think since it’s abandoned no one goes there, but that’s not true.” Ahniah stopped speaking for a moment. They stood just outside the police station. “Giuseppe takes time out of his day to scope out abandoned towns for that purpose, James too. But it’s not always just policemen who find the bodies.”

“Urban explorers?” Regan cut in.

"Yes, exactly.. But enough about that. Wasn't there something you wanted to tell me?" Ahniah looked back at the station, seeing Officer Duval walk out, his uniform jacket was off and over his shoulder, exposing a tight white T-shirt and a gold chain, tucked and his boots looked dirty, like he got dressed in a hurry. He looked up and saw both Ahniah and Regan standing there speaking and rushed over to them.

“Hope I’m not interrupting, seems you two are in deep conversation. What's up?” Officer Duval smiled widely at Regan, who returned a smile back. “Hi, Regan. Nice to see you again.”

“Hi, Officer.” She began, before looking back at Ahniah. "Anyway, I was saying, I needed to tell you something important.. Those two men I saw, that live in the woods, well this morning as I was taking a shower, one of the guys, the Gothic looking one, he was watching me shower, dead watching me.. Creepiest thing I ever saw." Ahniah and James' face turned red.

"This morning?" James asked.

"Yeah, but the other guy with him dragged him off.." Regan crossed her arms, feeling uneasy.

"Well! I mean he is a creepy fuck, I wouldn't think too much of it, men will be men, just don't pay those assholes any attention, the less you see of them the better." James gently placed a hand on Regan's shoulder, trying to assure her that nothing was going to happen to her.

"Thanks, Officer. I appreciate it." She smiled, her hand resting on his.

“I feel we’ve gotten past the point of ‘officer’. Just call me James.” She nodded, as he looked at her, almost with admiration. He thought she was gorgeous, like a Giselle. He looked around to hear other officers yelling at each other to get in their cars so they could go, and some hollered out to James, but he payed no attention. “Look I was wondering if maybe you wanted to grab a drink or something, tonight?” He firmly asked her, no sugar coating it, which made Regan tempted. She loved a gorgeous man who took charge and went after what he wanted. Being the anti-social she was back at home, she wasn’t usually interested in seeing anyone, but starting a new life meant meeting new people, and James was definitely a charmer.

“Sure, I’d love to.” Regan grimaced. Ahniah clapped, happy to see Regan and James getting to know one another. Ahniah knew how hard it was making new friends, and meeting people, and Regan looked more shy than anyone Ahniah ever met.

“I’m so glad we’re all friends now, maybe one night we can all grab some dinner together?” She asked Regan, James was also waiting for an answer.

“Yes, it’s a plan, for sure.” Regan nodded fiercely. James pulled out a card from his pocket, his telephone number was placed on the back. “It’s my personal number don’t worry, and uh... I don’t usually give this away to people, so..” He glanced at her, she felt happier than she’d been since moving out of Atlanta. Was this a date?

“Here’s mine too. Just in case, ya never know when I may need some help.” His eyes grew wide, flirting 101. He took his phone out and placed her number in it. “I’ll be using this.”

“DUVAL! GET THE FUCK OVER HERE, WE GOTTA GO MEET WITH ANDREWS!” He overheard his boss screaming at him from behind, which only meant one thing.

“Duty calls.. Gotta run, but I’ll.. I’ll call you later on. Have a good one.” James winked at her, before running off. Ahniah just stood there, being the third wheel.

“You’re going on a date, already!” She clapped.

“No. No! It’s just a friendly outing is all, it’s good to meet people, especially when you’re living in a town with literally no one around.” But Regan knew better, this was I fact a date, and she was excited. “Anyway, I better head back home, I have some things to take care of.”  
Ahniah nodded and hugged Regan calmly. She was happy to have a friend in Ahniah, she needed someone like her in her life. Someone who was like her in many ways.

**LEAVING GLEN JEAN, PLEASE COME BACK SOON**

She was officially back in Thurmond. Pulling onto the dirt road and back to her 3 story home. She saw Marilyn once again sitting outside, sipping on her tea, with the obnoxious John helping her feed her two cats, he put the bowls down and looked up to see Regan pulling in, she tried to avoid him, but he was persistent.

“Howdy neighbor!” He waved roughly.  
She didn’t respond. She grabbed her keys and started unlocking the door.

“Awe, come on don’t be like that, Regan!” He sarcastically pouted. She rolled her eyes and went inside, slamming the door shut behind her. She could hear his laughter from outside, what a smart ass.  
She didn’t care about how stupid her neighbors were, she had more important things to look forward to, like seeing James that night, she was ready to get her drink on with a cute guy, and getting to know someone who she might actually for once be compatible with. Maybe this was her chance at finding true love, although she didn’t want to get ahead of herself.

Night fell quick, it seemed to have fell more and more quickly each night, she lay on her couch in the living room, the only three seated couch that looked less damaged than the rest. She stared at the ceiling, picturing a better life, when she heard a ding on her phone.

**Text from: James**  
_Hey, there. It’s James, I’ll be working late, we had a huge case today. But if you’re up around midnight, I promise we’ll still have a wonderful time._  
Regan glistened, she was willing to stay up as late as possible for this one chance of happiness, even though she was tired, she was ready for this. She got up and went upstairs to find some appropriate clothing, and saw a cute red dress she wore for her high school prom, which lucky for her still fit. She lay it out on her bed for when it was time to get ready, and lay across the bed, looking up at the dank broken down ceiling. Why was everything such a disaster in this home?

_THUMP_   
_THUMP_

Regan jolted upward, a loud thumping noise was coming from her window. The curtains were down and she couldn’t see but she could sense that something was out there, but what could be hitting her window on the second floor?

_THUMP_   
_THUMP_

There it was again… She wasn’t prepared for what happened next. Nothing could ever prepare you. She went downstairs and threw the front door open, knowing if it was John and Ogre, she would open a can of kick ass on them, she wasn’t in the mood for their games.

“Okay, John if you’re the one hitting my fucking window, enough is enough!” She held her pocketknife close, opening it up in case shit got real. There was no way she was going down without a fight.

“Hello?” She called out, her voice cracking. But no one was there, maybe she was just imagining things. Maybe it was just a tree branch or the window being so old, the wind was moving it.  
She stood in her place for a moment than started walking back towards her front door, when she heard rustling from the bushes next to her house, along with whispers. She knew this time; things were about to get really bad.

“I have a knife, so try me!”  
That’s exactly what happened.

BANG!  
Out stepped Ogre, the crazy Gothic mad man, holding a shovel. He knocked her to the ground, and she was out cold, and next thing he knew, he was dealing with dead weight, and everything went dark.

The next morning, when Regan awakened, her eyes were groggy, her head was pounding, she took her hand and placed it on the back of her head, a huge lump was newly placed there. She couldn’t make out much, her eyes were still heavy, she felt like she had just recovered from being plastered, and drugged at the same time, although she didn’t remember going out with James. Oh shit… James, what happened?  
Her eyes started coming back to their natural vision, she rubbed them gently and looked around, it was pitch black, and not familiar to her at all. She looked down at her body, her ankles were tied by thick rope, and so were her hands. Her hair was down and a tangled mess, she was dirty, sitting on a nasty mattress that look like it came from a horror movie.  
She looked up, seeing a man standing in front of her but it was hard to make out who it was at first. He was in the shadows, leaning against the wall, his arms crossed, but his evil chuckle made the whole room go eerie.  
He finally stepped out, and without question, she knew who it was. John.  
He kneeled in front of her, brushing a single hair strand from her face.

“Well hello darling, welcome to my home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now we're getting to the good stuff.  
Stay tuned, next chapter is when the fun begins.


	3. Secluded

**GLEN JEAN**

“Have you heard from, Regan?” James walked up to Ahniah who was sitting down at a small café right by the grocery market.

“Mm, no. Not since yesterday when you asked her out, why?”

“We never went out.” James placed his hands on his waist, looking almost heart broken.

“She stood you up?!” Ahniah stood up, almost spilling her latte. “That’s fucked up.”

“No.. I mean she texted me and said she was excited about going out after I got off, but I told her It would be a bit later than expected, but that didn’t seem to bother her.” James let out a sigh and continued, fearing there was something not right about the situation.

“Are you sure she didn’t just pass out? I mean it was late, maybe she just got really tired. I wouldn’t worry too much.” Ahniah sat back down, and sipped on her latte, but James knew something was off about this. “She would have texted me that she was too tired.” He sat down in front of her, his hand on his gun holster. “Maybe I should go to Thurmond.”

“No!” Ahniah shouted, gathering the attention of everyone within a ten-foot radius. She brushed a strand of hair behind her ear awkwardly, and whispered. “You know the last time you went there, James. Things went bad, they’ll recognize you.”

James closed his eyes and buried his face in his hands. He had an intense past with Thurmond, it was a place he was very much aware of, having been there many times but keeping it a secret. Truth be told, he had a run in with a couple people there, that didn’t like him. He had enemies in Thurmond, those enemies were John and Ogre. He knew them more than people thought. He kept the fact he knew them from anyone else, in hopes it he wouldn’t be traced back to the mad men.

“She encountered them more than once, she even told us Ogre was stalking her as she showered. Come on now, Ahniah isn’t it suspicious?” James grabbed her hands, pleading with her. Ahniah did not want to be a part of whatever James had in mind, but also didn’t want him going to Thurmond alone.

They saw Officer Andrews walking towards them, a big smile etched on his face, with donuts in one hand and a coffee in the other. “Hello dear friends, what are we talking about here?” He sat down next to Ahniah and planted a kiss on his cheek. “Oh, how was your date last night, fuck her yet?” Giuseppe laughed, but no one else joined him. He realized that whatever Ahniah and James were talking about, was serious. “Well shit, brighten up guys.”

“I’m going to Thurmond.” James exhaled.

“Like hell you are.” Giuseppe stated, biting in his doughnut, handing some to Ahniah, who pushed it away.

“Not hungry, just worried now. Tried not to be worried, but honestly those two men are known for being stalkers.”

“Who?” Giuseppe looked confused, he wasn’t as up to speed as James and Ahniah were, and although he knew the dangers of Thurmond, he wasn’t aware of just how dangerous it really was.

“The crazy men who live in the woods near Regan’s house. James fears something may have happened to her and that’s why he wants to go there, I was thinking you could go with him, seeing as though I won’t let him go by himself.” Ahniah gazed at James, narrow eyed.

“I’ll go sure, but I’m sure she’s okay. Shit like what you’re thinking only happens in movies, and books…”

“Yeah, well than we’ve been in a lot of movies because we’ve seen the worst before. Dead bodies, decapitated heads, yeah, we’ve seen it all.” James rolled his eyes, and took his coffee before sprinting off to his vehicle, he wanted to waste no time, and waved for Giuseppe to hurry up.

“He really must want pussy.”

“Shut the fuck up, G. He actually seems worried, just make sure you two come back in one piece. Her too.” Ahniah’s expression was apprehensive. Giuseppe grabbed her face with his hands and kissed her gently, knowing how worried she got when he went on dangerous missions, he loved how much she cared.

“You know you’re cute when you’re anxious.” Giuseppe winked at her, starting to walk away, but not wanting to let go of each other hand. “Don’t worry baby, I’ll be back, we all will.” Just like that, they were off. Leaving Ahniah in the town to worry for the remainder of the day.

**THURMOND**

Regan was pushed up against the wall. Her face was dirty, covered in dry blood and her hair was tangled, like a bird’s nest. Her hands were tied up tightly, and her ankles were chained. She had a rope around her neck, like they were going to hang her at any moment. All she could see was a speck of light coming through the wooded up windows, and she could barely make out what room she was in, it was still pitch black, but she could hear the sounds of two men coming from just outside the door, it was apparent Ogre and John had kidnapped her, but what were their true intentions, and why Regan?  
She tried listening in, inching her way to the door as close as she could get, but it still sounded a bit muffled.

“Are you OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MIND?” Regan heard a loud voice, he banged on the door, making Regan jump, causing her chains to make a loud clanking sound, but the men outside didn’t pay any attention. No one answered him, which by the sound of his voice, Regan knew it was John speaking. She saw him briefly when she first opened her eyes, him welcoming her to his home, but she had passed out again, mostly from shock. Was this really what her life was coming to? Being kidnapped on her second day in a new state. This was exactly the luck that always made Regan hate her existence.

“I asked you a fucking question, asshole. Why’d you bring the girl here?”

“She knows we’re dangerous, surely she’ll go to the police.”

“She doesn’t know jack shit! Even if she did hear the rumors, you stalking her this morning was SURELY not gonna make the situation any better.” John pushed Ogre into the brick wall behind him, but Ogre didn’t budge, it was clear he was the alpha male, and was the one who called the shots.

“Someone is gonna come looking for her, Ogre. You aren’t fuckin’ smart.” John sat on the chair beside him, his hand rubbing on his temples.  
“No one is gonna look for the cunt! She moved here for a reason, you said she had personal issues, no one cares about her, I mean for fuck sake she moved to this shit fuckin’ town, who is gonna find her?” Ogre’s voice raised, Regan could hear them both clearly now. Her regret for telling John why she moved, but now knowing that’s why he asked. She crawled to the nearest corner of the room, trying not to make any noises, but couldn’t control her emotions, letting out a loud sob before holding her mouth, something there were things she couldn’t control, and obviously being abducted was one of them. Soon after, the door slammed open, almost breaking in half. Ogre stood there, as Regan held her eyes shut, the light almost blinding her.

“Shut the fuck up, bitch. No one wants to hear you cry.” Ogre stepped in, his boots banging on the wooden floor, you could tell he was around from miles away.  
She couldn’t speak, not like she wanted to however. Her eyes stayed shut, but she could feel him getting closer to her, until he was kneeling right in front of, finally she opened her eyes. It was a weird feeling being this close to the man who was stalking her. She wanted to smack him, but also didn’t want to be killed. She didn’t know what was going to happen to her, but tried remaining as calm as possible.

“You’re a pretty thing. I bet you’re prettier naked.” Ogre licked his lips before caressing her face, this made Regan extremely uncomfortable, but she didn’t want to come off as vulnerable, and was prepared to take whatever punishments she was about to receive.

“Oh now you have nothing to say, all you wanna do is cry? Cry to your mommy and daddy who don’t want you anymore?” Ogre mocked her, her eyes becoming more crystal clear from the anger bottling up inside her. He was a mess, his face was all torn apart, the scars were starting to bleed, he smelled like he came out of a sewer and never washed himself. This was the life he chose to live, a kidnapping hobo. She stared at him, making him feel more threatened.

“What are you gonna do, bitch? Kill me? Please, go ahead.” He smiled, his yellow teeth shining in the light, it was awful. She didn’t want to stare at him any longer but knew she needed to be on her A game if she was going to make it out alive, she wasn’t going down so easily, she was the boss at someone else’s game.

“No, I don’t wanna kill you. Are you gonna kill me?” She finally spoke.

“Oh you can fuckin’ bet on it.” Ogre grabbed her arm, their faces centimeters apart. He licked her cheek slowly, making her wanna vomit, but she took it, knowing that resisting would only make it harder for her to survive. The best way to win was to let him take over her, as crazy as it sounded.

“Ogre for fuck sake! Get out of here.” She saw John coming in, his face was red as if he had been crying, he was smoking what looked like a blunt, and his grey t-shirt was torn up like he had tried ripping it off instead of taking it off the regular way. Ogre may have been the main man of the house, but he always listened to John, and backed off, holding his hands up surrender style, before exiting the room. John stood there, arms folded, looking Regan up and down before rushing out of the room, leaving the door wide open. There wasn’t much she could do to try and escape, and didn’t attempt to try. Knowing what she saw in movies, trying to escape a captor’s home, never ended in success.

John walked outside and sped walked to a nearby tire swing, he jumped on his, turning his back to the house, not wanting to look at it. He took a puff of his blunt and looked up at the sky. It was beautiful, much like the woods, he was always into secluded areas, being surrounded by trees and nature was always his dream, he loved being away from society, not having to worry about anyone judging him, but this was the test of his life. Keep the girl, kill her. Let her go, and potentially go to prison for abduction. Boy, was Ogre a fucking moron. But John always stood by Ogre’s choices, they were brothers of course, not by blood, but they grew up together, thick as thieves, in a literal sense. He leaned his head against the chain holding the tire up, and let out a deep sigh, he saw from the corner of his eye Ogre hitting some trees with sticks, Jeffrey Dahmer style. It was obvious Ogre wasn’t all right in the head, but didn’t think he’d go this far to take an innocent girl he didn’t know. Ogre may have had a past of kidnapping people, he even murdered people, but Ogre always claimed he had his reasons. But what was his reason for kidnapping Regan? John needed to know. But he sat on the swing for a bit longer, watching the snowy clouds in the sky, trying to think of how life would be is he followed his own dreams instead of fucking his life up to move with Ogre.

What a life it is, what a fucking life.


	4. The Stolen Girl

It was nightfall, Regan’s first full day ended in her new home. Her emotions were completely drained, she had nothing else in her left to cry out. She couldn’t escape, she couldn’t run. There wasn’t anything she could do. For once in her life, she felt completely overpowered. It was a new feeling she hated, she was always in control of everything, she knew how to get out of dangerous situations, no one knew just how emotionally and physically strong she was, not even her own parents, or sister knew how strong she was. She thought she could stay strong or the sake of her own sanity, but the truth was she was a mess. She looked like a mess, she felt like a freight train had run her over twenty times, she felt like everything was crashing down on her over and over again, and couldn’t understand why this was happening to her. All she wanted to do was go home, not to her house in Thurmond, but Atlanta, back with her family. She wondered how things would be if she hadn’t run away, how maybe if she just listened to her parents and got a job, maybe she wouldn’t be in this situation. The fact was, Regan wanted a life, she wanted a job, but she wanted to prove to everyone that she was capable of doing those things on her own, but instead she moved to a ghost town, not having a real reason why, just to get away from society, the same as John.  
-  
John lay beneath a large tree in the woods, it was his private spot where not even Ogre could find him, he didn’t want to leave him in the house alone with Regan, but couldn’t bear to return there yet. He needed time to clear his mind, he needed a sense of clarity that things would be alright, not only for him, but for her too. He didn’t want to kill her, he wasn’t a murderer, it was Ogre who had him doing those nasty deeds, he felt like a slave in Ogre’s grip, but didn’t want to be the weak one. He pleased Ogre, in many ways more than one. Secrets that shall be kept hidden forever.  
He knew he had to get up and go back, but he dreaded that feeling. He also knew he had to put on a mean man face and make sure she knew who the boss was in order for her not to see him as vulnerable. He got up and placed his hands in his pockets before heading back to the cabin. It was placed deep inside the woods, which almost looked like a forest, which is what John called it. The woods went on for miles, no one was ever able to locate the cabin, except Ogre and John while they were on the run, no one even attempted their search for them after they got to Thurmond, there was no point. No one would find this cabin, no one ever.

“Hey! Stop, come on seriously leave me alone, haven’t you had enough fun for tonight? Get the fuck off me!” Regan snapped at Ogre, who was fondling her excessively. He wasn’t paying attention to her, he tried ripping her sweater off, along with her jeans, but she pushed him away with her foot, but he was too strong for her. He threw her down on the ground and got on top of her, laughing at how hard she was trying to get him off her, but never seemed to work.

“I told you, you’d look prettier naked. Don’t worry I won’t hurt you, not tonight anyway.” Ogre grunted before finally ripping her shirt off, exposing a black silk bra. She threw her arms over her chest, trying to hide herself, but Ogre paid no attention to that and started trying to remove her pants. That was the scariest part, he said he wouldn’t hurt her, but he was a murderer, and a kidnapper, of course he was a liar too.

“Stop, please, I’m begging you.” Regan spoke in almost a whisper, she didn’t want to fight him anymore, she just wanted to be left alone.

“Begging makes this even more fun, now stay still and we won’t have any more problems.” She closed her eyes and sighed, letting him finish out what he was doing, he inched her pants down slowly, examining her closely, his face reached her stomach, smelling her and taking in everything he was seeing, she couldn’t look down at him, she looked at the ceiling, trying to ignore everything that was going on, unintentional tears fell from her face. She tried not to make any noises, but there was fear, and she couldn’t help it. He was going to rape her, and she had to take it. She knew if John were here he would at least tell him to back off, or would he let him rape her? Would John rape her?  
Soon her pants were completely off, her matching bra and panties were exposed now, for Ogre to take advantage of. He never set his eyes off her body, smiling through every part of her he was touching, his hands gliding from her neck to her shoulders, his other hand from her chest to the bottom of her stomach, before stopping right before her waist.

“I am a good boy tonight; I won’t do anything that makes you… Uncomfortable.” But Regan knew from how he spoke not to believe him, even he didn’t believe him, surely he needed to work on his sarcasm. He stopped for a moment, waiting to see if she’d beg more, but when she didn’t speak anymore, his hand reached for her panties, but before he could completely remove them, as her tears become more a waterfall, he heard a door opening from the other room, along with a hard slam.

“Ogre? Where are you, idiot?” She heard John, covering her face from embarrassment. He walked to the room they were in, standing there wide eyed. Not believing what he was seeing. His anger consumed him, his fists in a tight ball, Ogre could see it. He got up and stood face to face with John, whose face was as red as he’d ever seen it.

“You were ‘bout to rape her?” John’s face cocked sideways. His narrowed eyes looked over at Regan, whose hands were still covering her own face.

“Maybe… and?” Ogre spoke in a tone, a tone that meant a fight was about to break out if John didn’t step back. “You sure you wanna size me up, boy?”

“Do not fuck with me today, Ogre I’m not in a mood to be fucked with.”

“Oh, but you are any other night.” Ogre, smiling with that crooked smile. John had enough. John balled his fist up, Regan could hear a loud **SMACK** before a hard **THUD** of someone hitting the ground. She let go of her face and looked over to see Ogre on the ground holding his cheek and John spitting on him, standing over him like he was just victorious in a battle.

“Shut your fuckin’ mouth before you lose it. I don’t care who you are, I won’t be talked to in any way you fucking please, hear me?!” John bent over him, screaming in his face, why was he protecting Regan? He was just as much of a kidnapper as Ogre was, so what really were his intentions?

“Why’d you do that? He could hurt you?” Regan finally sat up, her knees to her chest, trying not to showoff too much of herself.

“I don’t like being talked to like I’m a child. I’m a man, a 40-year-old man, who WILL be respected. You got something to say too? Huh!?” John knew he needed to calm down, trying not to take his anger out of her, but he knew she had every right to hate him, and be angry back at him. She was the abducted of course.  
Before he could apologize, and before she could speak up, he turned on his heel and hurried out of the room, to get her some new clothes, which Ogre had stolen her bag earlier so she couldn’t get re-dressed. He already had his motives, and knew he would be back again.

**THURMOND**

James and Giuseppe had just arrived in Thurmond. After thinking through the night on what they wanted to do, they decided they were going after all. James was worried, not a text, not a call, not a visit, nothing at all. She wouldn’t just stay in Thurmond with nothing to do, she had new friends in Glen Jean, why would she just ignore the for no reason?  
When they arrived to the small town, James started tensing up, he looked around with the palm of his hand pressed against his chin, cringing at every broken down building he saw, how could someone want to live here, and why someone like Regan?  
“You okay, friend?” James heard Giuseppe’s raspy voice, the first time they’ve spoken on their drive. But he didn’t answer. “It’ll be fine, I’m sure she’s just being her usual shy self. Maybe she got cold feet and felt bad about it.”

“No… I don’t think so.” James finally spoke. But said no more after.

They pulled in to what looked like a burned down post office, which was right at the entrance of the city, near the sign. Everything looked so old, of course everything was built in the early 1900s, so yeah it was old, but also looked like it hadn’t been touched since it was built. James and Giuseppe looked disgusted, James hadn’t been to Thurmond in years, and forgot what it was like to walk on its dirt roads. Giuseppe never scoped the whole place, just the beginning of the woods when the first call was made on Ogre and John, but neither walked through the woods at all, they turned back, which is what they thought about doing just now.

“Do you know which house is hers, or are we just guessing?” Giuseppe folded his arms, feeling on edge about being there.

“There are 4 houses in sight, I’m sure we’ll find her.” James uttered, before walking towards the main part of town where the houses stood. He noticed one house whose door was wide open, the house which belonged to Marilyn. She was outside with her cat rocking in her chair with a newspaper, not paying attention to the men walking up to her porch.

“Hi, excuse me miss?” James tapped her knee, she jolted upwards, before throwing her newspaper on the ground, her cat running away immediately.

“Don’t you know it’s rude to startle an old lady!” Marilyn glared at the men, they were waiting for her eyes to turn red, James gulped.

“I’m sorry ma’am, I meant not to scare you. I was wondering if we could ask you a couple questions.”  
She looked at them both, they were wearing their police uniforms, she scratched her head awkwardly.

“I’m sorry officers, I wasn’t paying attention to the uniforms, I didn’t mean to yell. Of course, what seems to the problem?” She shook their hands gracefully, even smiling a little to ease the tension.

“No worries ma’am, we’re looking for a girl, her name is Regan, she just moved here a couple days ago.” James began, but Giuseppe stepped in.

“Young, brown hair, blue eyes, last seen wearing a black sweater, seen her?”

“She eyed them both and pointed over to the three story home across from hers. “There, she lives there. That’s her car. Beautiful young lady indeed, but I haven’t seen her come out since yesterday morning.” James and Giuseppe jerked their heads over to the home, and walked over to it. They noticed her front door was wide open, and her car was parked in her backyard.

“Regan?” James spoke loudly, his hand on his gun. No one answered.

“Regan are you in here?” Giuseppe repeated after James. But still, nothing.

“Maybe she went for a walk?” Giuseppe looked over at James, who wasn’t buying it.

“No, the lady said she hasn’t come out since yesterday.”

“Unless she wasn’t paying attention.”

“She would have known if she walked out, she’s been sitting on the porch.”

Giuseppe walked back outside while James investigated further inside, he felt bad for barging in, just in case she really was just out for a walk or doing something, it gave him a weird feeling, but something else inside of him just knew something wasn’t right. He walked upstairs, still calling out her name but with no luck. She wasn’t in the house. He stood still momentarily, sighing harshly. Then he heard Giuseppe calling out for him, his voice cracking.

“Um, James! You’re gonna wanna see this!” James scurried downstairs as fast as possible, his hand gripping his gun, and seeing Marilyn being nosey wondering what the problem was, she stared at them awkwardly before James looked down at the front steps that Giuseppe was pointing at.

“Is that BLOOD?” James covered his mouth. A single puddle of dry blood was neatly splat on the front step of her porch. How did they not see that? James took out his phone and dialed Regan’s number, hoping she was okay, his heart raced. This wasn’t good.  
Giuseppe walked few paces away from James, also taking out his phone to call Ahniah and tell her what they saw. She sounded frantic, hoping it wasn’t her blood but not knowing for sure.

“Come on, Regan pick up.” James babbled. Finally, there was an answer. He waited to see if she’d speak but when she said nothing he began.

“Regan are you okay? We see blood on your steps, did something happen? What’s going o-“

“Regan is fine… She’s with me.” James heard a familiar voice on the other end. His hand was shaking. “Why don’t you come get her.. Officer.” The voice cackled.

“WHAT DID YOU DO WITH HER, OGRE? I SWEAR IF YOU HURT HER I’LL CUT YOUR THROAT!”  
Giuseppe spun around, running over to James, whose eyes were watery and his hands shook violently.

“Oh I’m gonna hurt her. It’s only a matter of when. Let’s see if you can find us before her body pops up in Thurmond, a dismembered mess.” Like that, the phone hung up, leaving James in a state of helplessness.

“Call every officer you have in Glen Jean, and every town after that, we’re going on a hunt.” James spoke calmly.

“They have her?”

“Yes. And we’re getting her back.”

"Should I call her family?”

“Call everyone you can, this is the last time they fuck with us, we’re getting her out of this, alive.”


	5. When The Heart Grows Fond

_“You’re fucking crazy you know that? Are you aware that, that is exactly what’s going to happen? Their gonna come looking for her and we’re done for, you don’t think Ogre!”_

_“I’m gonna make sure that if by some chance they do show up, she won’t be alive, I’ll pick her dead body out with my teeth before they take her out of here alive!”_

_“You are fucking nuts, Nivek. Seriously fucking nuts, you cannot kill her, she did nothing wrong, hear me? I won’t fucking let you kill her.”_

_“Are you scared that I can’t get away with this? You’ve always been one to shy away from this sort of thing, I often wonder how you made it this far with me, you’re a pussy.”_

Regan’s eyes opened, she could hear them speak, but what were they talking about?

_"I’m NOT SCARED."_

_“YOU ARE! Don’t tell me you’ve grown fond of the cunt?"_

_“Of course not, I don’t grow fond, I don’t need love, and I don’t need her. I’m stating not to kill her, or you’ll be done for.”_

_“We’ll be done for…”_

_“You’re impossible to talk to.”_

Regan pushed herself to the door, she was weak but managed to lean against the door, now being able to hear clearly, still trying to figure out what they were talking about.

_“We’ll go down together like we made it through together, brother. It’s always been you and I.”_

_“You don’t get the situation you just threw us in, we’re in just as much danger now. You really don’t think.”_

_“Maybe you need something to help you get into the killing mood.”_

Regan didn’t hear anything else, it grew quiet. She pressed her ear to the door harder, wondering if they had left the room, what did Ogre mean by that? What were they doing?

_“Stop! I don’t want this! You can’t do this, it’s wrong and I won’t allow it. You’re not fucking getting it! They are COMING for her, their gonna find her, they won’t stop!”_

_“So I say we deal with her now. I’ll fuck her, you take what’s left over, we throw the body and run.”_

More silence followed, it seemed Ogre wasn’t comprehending the dangers of what he had just done. He got up from his knees, and sat down on the busted wooden chair beside him.

_“Fuck you, I won’t do it.”_

_“I knew you were fond of her. You like her so much you can’t kill her. But yet you’ve had no problem with anyone else. What’s special of her? Can she suck a dick good, better than me?”_

_“SHUT THE FUCK UP!”_

Regan could hear John knocking over chairs and breaking whatever was in hands reach, she tried not to make noise, so they couldn’t tell she was being nosey, surely they must know she could hear though, but she remained near the door, listening in.

_“Tomorrow I WILL KILL HER, I will take over her body, I will claim her innocence, and there is NOTHING you will do to stop me, and if you try, be prepared to fail miserably. Better kiss your little girlfriend goodbye, cos she’s mine now, bitch.”_

Ogre walked away, leaving John to stand there on his own, his thoughts racing a million miles a second. Suddenly a tear fell from his eye, he couldn’t believe the situation he put himself in. His stomach was in knots as he stood there, watching Ogre leave eyes view. They weren’t safe anymore, they were going to find them.

_“Fuck. What have I done? Their gonna rescue her, and we’re gonna be rotting away in a prison cell if not executed. Why do I do these things? Why do I let Ogre push me around? Why do I let him treat me like a puppet?”_

Regan heard him whispering to himself, she almost felt bad. But he did put himself in this situation, and knew she shouldn’t care what happened to him.

Wait? Did he say someone’s coming to rescue her?


	6. Feeling Dead Already

This way it. It was now or never, there was no turning back now. This was going to happen, and this time, someone was coming out victorious, and it was going to be the good guys.  
James grabbed his phone and dialed every police station in a 15-mile radius, while Giuseppe tried getting in contact with Regan’s parents to let them know the situation. After hearing the story of why Regan decided to come to Thurmond in the first place, Giuseppe was hesitant, but knew he had to make the call. But he stared at his phone, not knowing what to say if they picked up. How would he tell her parents that she was being held hostage by two psycho men deep in the woods, and having small doubts about whether or not she’d be found? While he rehearsed his conversation, James was sitting in his police car, they were still in Thurmond, having spent the whole night there planning their attack and how they were going to begin this mission. He was angry, and frustrated with this mess, the one time he meets a girl he connected with, and it all goes to shit right when things were getting good. It always happened to James, it was almost as though he was a bad luck charm. But he didn’t want to ruin his motivation to find her, he managed to calm down a bit, waiting for the other officers to arrive. They knew they couldn’t just go into the woods and begin a chase to rescue someone, they had to plan. John and Ogre were heavily armed, Ogre knew they were going to be looking for her, and James had to scout every area of Thurmond, in case they were hiding and came out to charge at the officers.

He called Ahniah next, to tell her that everything was going to be alright, and that Regan was going to be safe and make it out alive, but Ahniah was skeptical. James and her knew the dangers of Ogre, and how he would kill her before they could get close enough, those were the games he liked to play. They knew John was deranged as well, but he was more likely to spare her. God damn, the rumors circulating these men were almost disgusting to think about. James put his hands on his head, covering his face and taking multiple deep sighs, trying to reduce his anxiety, but nothing was working. He didn’t want to see this town fail, it wasn’t the town itself that was scary, it was the things that happened inside of it. Ogre and John were not the first two men to cause havoc in the ghost town, since the early 1900s, people were always up to no good, thinking that because it was such a small place, that no one would go looking for the bad guys, but it never turned out that way, that was exactly why people went to Thurmond, to get the bad guys and bring justice to the victims, this was a small area, so there were always good chances the bad guys got caught, and they did.  
As James waited for the other policemen to arrive, coming from all different towns, he heard Giuseppe in the background sounding frantic, trying to calm someone down, but not doing a very good job at it. He looked back at him, knowing that meant he got ahold of her parents. By the way Giuseppe spoke, they were freaking out, and wondering what was going on. James walked over to him, and grabbed the phone from his hands, while Giuseppe sat down on Marilyn Brown’s steps, before holding his hands to his face.

“Hi, this is Officer James Duval, I’m a sheriff at Glen Jean’s police station, is this Regan’s mother?” The voice on the other end cracked with fear and uncontrollable crying, coming from an older woman who sounded like she was in her mid-50’s. She could barely speak, until a man could be heard in the background trying to calm her down, he then took the phone and began to talk.

“Hi Officer, don’t mind my Wife, she doesn’t know how to control her emotions.”

“Completely understandable sir, due to the circumstances.”

“What’s gonna happen to my daughter, Officer? Is she gonna be okay, are you gonna be able to find her? Do I gotta drive out there and cause some chaos?” Regan’s father sounded furious, he was angrier than sad, and James could tell he cared about his daughter’s wellbeing, no matter how things ended between them. James took a deep breath and thought for a moment.

“Would you be willing to come out here and help us rescue your daughter, sir?”  
There was a long pause, it was almost awkward, James was sure he was going to say no.”

“Call me, Tom. Yes, I’ll be there, just tell me where to meet ya, and I’ll be there.” Tom spoke calmly, trying to seem concerned.  
James gave him an address and hung up with Tom, things were beginning to come full circle. Maybe there was a chance Regan would make it out alive, they just needed a strategy.

-  
John sat down at his table eating, trying not to pay attention to Ogre assaulting Regan in the other room. He had tried raping her several times, but John stopped him each time. Ogre made it clear that if John tried interfering with anything he did, he’d kill him. What was he supposed to do now? He felt bad, he had never once cared what Ogre did to anyone, and often laughed at how stupid Ogre was but gave him props for his skills on rape, disgustingly enough. But this time was different, with each kidnapping, with each murder, there was always a reason. Whether it had been someone fucking them over, or someone finding their cabin and trying to rob them or play pranks, Ogre never took that lightly. But to take an innocent girl out of her home just because he wanted to fuck her over and over again was a dangerous and bold move, and John hated it.

“I’m gonna cut you up, girl. I’m gonna eat out your insides and jump rope with your intestines, you hear me? You better get used to my face, ‘cos it’s gonna be the last one you see before you die.” Ogre’s voice haunted Regan, his deep, but smooth southern accent was enough to make anyone feel uneasy. She squirmed and tried moving away from him, but his grip was strong and gave her bruises on her wrists from how hard he was holding her down. She was lying flat on the wooden floor, not even on the bed. He wanted to make her as uncomfortable as possible. He loved seeing her beg for mercy, it turned him on, and made it harder for him to want to leave her alone.

“You sure do love picking a fight with me, I love it. Keep going, we can do this all day I have nowhere to be except right here.” Ogre’s demonic laugh made Regan’s stomach turn in knots. This was it, he was either going to kill her or rape her. But her mind kept getting in the way of what was happening, she remembered hearing John say that someone was coming for her, that apparently Ogre had answered Regan’s phone and gave it away that she was there with them, and that Ogre thought of this as a game of hide and seek.

“This is a sick game, Ogre. Please, just let me go. I’ve done nothing wrong.” Regan whimpered, trying to break his grip. He stared at her in silence, a side grin appeared on his face. His grip unsnapped, his hands up in surrender, he backed away slowly, still on his knees, never removing his gaze from her. She didn’t move, she stayed on the ground, she knew better than to believe he’d listen to her, and continued looking at him, waiting for him to make a sick joke and continue doing what he was doing. At this moment, she almost wanted John to bust in and tell him to fuck off, but knew that wasn’t going to happen, John cared more about his wellbeing than someone else’s, especially someone he kidnapped.

“You wanna leave so bad? Well you can try. I say I’ll give you maybe a 5-minute head start. But I do know every part of these here woods, you will get lost before you make your way out of here, you’re far from your home, you wanna take the risk? Let’s have some fun.”  
That was Regan’s wake up call, that this way real. This was all too real. She was really being held hostage, and could do nothing about it. This was something that happened in movies, she never realized this sort of thing happened in real life. She had heard rumors about Thurmond before moving there, but she pushed them off to the side, thinking that rumors were rumors for a reason, because they’ve yet to be confirmed. But there she was, lying on a wooden floor half naked in front of her captor, she became the confirmation. She couldn’t escape even if she tried, it was a small cabin, she couldn’t hide, she couldn’t run away, even if she made it out of the house, she knew Ogre was right. She’d get lost, he’d find her and kill her on the spot for even attempting. Regan’s life was falling apart, as if it wasn’t from the start. If she had only listened to her parents, made something of herself instead of dragging herself around being fed by a diamond spoon, things wouldn’t be as bad as they were, to Regan this was karma at its finest.

“I thought so.” Ogre crawled back over to her, knees still to the ground but on top of her, he looked down at her, his fingers trailing her collar bone, down to her chest, and stomach. There he went again, making her as uncomfortable as he could, to try and make her beg. But this time she knew that’s what he wanted, and kept silent, he was almost impressed, but didn’t stop him from wanting to do horrible things to her.

“You’re gonna keep quiet now.” Ogre bent over and whispered in her ear. “I’m gonna fuck your brains out and you’re gonna take in every moment of it, and not make a single sound, you hear me?” Ogre’s raspy voice made her cringe, he was about to rape her, and of course she was going to make noise, hoping John would come in to put a stop to it.  
Ogre spun Regan around on her stomach, making her gasp in horror. She clenched her eyes shut and bit down on her arm, trying not to cry. This wasn’t happening, this couldn’t be happening, she wondered what it was about her that made her so appealing to Ogre, what was it about her that made him want to take her in the first place.

She could hear him rustling to take off his belt, and when he got it off she knew it was go time. She looked back and noticed his pants were dropped to his knees. There was nothing she could do to get away from this and knew that whatever was about happen, she’d have to remember it for the rest of her life, if she even survived through the night. But she couldn’t keep still, she couldn’t take it without a fight, she wasn’t about to let someone rape her and get away with it, even if she was unsuccessful, at least she tried.  
She screamed out in agony as he began, with every grunt from his mouth came a plea for help from hers, she got on her knees and tried moving away, but Ogre’s strength was no match for her, he pushed her face down on the ground and continued.

“Help me! John please help me don’t let him do this to me!” She cried, not being able to control her emotions, he could hear her endless call for help, but he couldn’t do anything.  
He could hear Ogre, thrusting himself into her like a mad dog. The door was wide open, John could hear everything, the smacking noises of Ogre banging her, like his life depended on it, and Regan’s uncontrollable crying as she begged for John’s help. Why did he care so much?  
His eyes were sealed shut, watering. His mouth quivered and his heart was racing as fast as lightning strikes. He hands were pressed against his ears as he sobbed, and hit his hand against the table, feeling so helpless. She knew he was out there, she could hear him banging his head on the table, she could hear his sobs, she could feel his anger inside her, like he was inside her emotionally. The pain from Ogre had went away, at this point she was just dead weight, the amount of energy he put into fucking her made her weak, she couldn’t move, as he finished up, wiping himself off onto her panties. He felt victorious, like he won a prize.

John got up swiftly and pushed the front door open as hard as he could and took out a cigarette, walking away from the house, as far away as he could. He didn’t want to look at it, he was done. He was done being pushed around, he was done letting Ogre tell him what to do, he wanted to save Regan, but knew to do that he had to go through Ogre, how was he going to do it? He needed to talk to Regan, but he couldn’t bear to look at her after what he heard. Her face was envisioned in his mind, her beautiful face being taken advantage of like that, broke him down. He managed to make it out of the houses view before falling to his knees and crying out. His tears fell like a water fall. He kept asking himself why, why did this have to happen? He wanted to save her, he wanted to knock Ogre’s teeth in as soon she cried for John’s name. She needed him, even after everything he did, and he couldn’t be there. He knew his endless spree of haunting and terrorizing Thurmond was over, this had become personal. John had to figure out a plan, he needed to rescue her before someone else did.  
But how?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I won't go to into detail with the sexual scenes, firstly I'm not good at writing detailed sex scenes, but in this case because it is a rape scene, I don't wanna detail it, but this is a trigger warning, I know some people may not appreciate it, but it's a crucial part of my story, stay tuned. xx


	7. Heartfelt

_I wanted to save her._   
_But I just didn’t know how to._   
_I couldn’t hear you scream anymore._   
_I had to get out of there._   
_Regan I’m sorry this is happening._   
_I want to save you, really I do._   
_But Ogre has us both in a fucked up situation._   
_If only you knew._   
_I will find a way to get you of this._   
_Even if I have to put my life on the line._

-  
John woke up to hear the shower running. He rubbed his eyes for a moment, looking down he saw he had fallen asleep on the concrete floor. He looked around him to see if Ogre was anywhere to be found but he wasn’t, probably out getting high somewhere deep in the woods where no one could find him. John felt it was the perfect opportunity to talk to Regan, to really have a heartfelt one on one. He stood up, and walked to the bedroom she was shackled in, he could see the chains leading into the bathroom, which was quite steamy. He looked over to the bed and saw her clothes lying there, and picked them up, and bringing them to her.

“Regan?” She heard a voice and immediately screamed out, a force of habit it seemed. “I’m sorry, it’s just me, Ogre isn’t here. I uh, brought your clothes.”  
Regan popped her head out of the shower and looked at John, his eyes were puffy and red, he looked like a mess. He had his lip piercing back in and a blunt hanging on his ear, for whenever something bad would happen and he smoked to get high enough to take away the emotional pain. Regan never understood that, weed only made her even more miserable, but to each their own.

“Um, thanks.” She said, turning off the water. She dried her hair off than wrapped herself up in the dirty blue towel that was clearly never washed. Who knows what was on it, but she needed a cover. John stood by the door. She stared at him for a moment, giving him the clues that she wanted him to turn around, which he did, leaning against the door, he closed his eyes for a moment, trying to think of how he was going to talk to her, knowing the last thing she wanted to do was to ask how the weather was.

“K, you can look now.” She spoke in an emotionless tone. He turned and saw her in a red dress, it was sleeved, and was meshed in the back, it was fairly short, just above the knee, but she had nothing else to wear, so that was as good as it got. She sat down on the bed, chains shackling around as she tried getting comfy, she tried not to look at him again, not being able to bear it. He stood there for a moment trying to find the right words, she could tell he wanted to say something, but was too scared. As he began to walk away, feeling angry with himself, Regan knew she had to speak up.

“Why did you run away?”  
He stopped dead in his tracks.

“What did you say?” He asked, turning back at her.

“I said, why did you run away? Yesterday, when I was calling out for you, you ran out the door and didn’t come back for the rest of the night.” John put his back to the wall across from her and slid down to the ground, placing his elbow on his knee and his palm on his temple, trying to find the words to answer her question. She spoke no more however, waiting for him to say at least something.

“I couldn’t listen to it.”

“You couldn’t listen to what, me being raped by some disgusting animal?” She got angry, her face turned red. She was now on her knees.

“I couldn’t hear you being hurt.” He wept. He knew there wasn’t an excuse for the things he had done to her, just kidnapping her was enough to make her hate him, but he didn’t want her to hate him, he wanted her to know he wasn’t as bad as she thought he was. That even though he was around Ogre and lived with him and watched him do all these nasty things, John would never partake. He only was around to get rid of the bodies, but never once committed the gruesome acts.

“You don’t care about me getting hurt.” She spoke in a tone full of aggravation.

“You really don’t get it do you? I CAN’T do anything without Ogre chewing my balls off. I want to help you, but if I do he’ll not only kill you, but he’ll make me watch and then kill me afterwards.” John became annoyed. Annoyed with how superior Ogre thought he was, just because he had more experience with this sort of thing and always assumed he’d never get caught. He looked up at the ceiling and let out a harsh sigh, scratching his head, trying not to get frustrated.

“I called for you, I wanted you to help me, as fucked up as you are for putting me in this place, you’re not as bad as him, you saved me from getting killed once already, I thought you’d save me from this too but I was wrong, you only care about yourself, it’s no wonder Ogre chews your balls off all the time.” She said, folding her arms and scooting back to the bed, leaning against the wooden wall behind her. He couldn’t say anything, because she was right, he was either really dumb, or just a pussy, maybe both.

“I want to help you, Regan. Don’t look at me as the piece of shit bad guy, I never wanted you to be brought here at all. You heard me ripping him apart the first night you were here? I was pissed. I didn’t want this for you. From the moment I saw you I knew there was something about you... Something crazy, but perfect.” He looked down at his hands, which were shaking.  
She didn’t know what to say. Why was he being so nice to her? What was it about her that was so perfect that there was an immediate attraction towards her?

“I care about you, Regan. We may not know one another, but I do. It hurts me to see him mess with you and it made me psychically sick knowing he raped you, I wanted to kill him.” He clenched his hands into fists and hit them on the floor. “He’s gonna pay, I swear it.”  
But she didn’t know whether to believe him, he could be saying anything to get her in a vulnerable place. She held up her guard, but tried to reason with him.

“Don’t do anything to get us killed, please. Just… Talk to me once in a while, it gets lonely. You’re the only one who hasn’t tried killing me, don’t shove Ogre’s knife in my back.” Her eyes watered, she was scared and lonely and didn’t know if anyone was really coming to get her or not, they could have been just saying that.

“Of course I’ll talk to you, and no I have no intentions of killing you.” For the first time, they both smiled. It was a moment they would soon both remember.  
He got up and brushed off his pants and shirt before heading out the door, when he heard Regan’s voice once more.

“Thanks…” She whispered.  
He looked at her with a genuine smile.

“Your welcome, Regan.” He darted out the front door, and like that Regan was alone again, but this time she didn’t feel so alone emotionally, maybe John wasn’t such a bad guy, it was almost as if he was just as trapped as Regan, she had to help him too.  
She prayed she was really being rescued though, maybe than John could be free too, away from this madness, but she knew he would never make it out of these woods without going behind bars, she was determined to see the real him, and maybe than they could unite to stop Ogre, or was this just a big joke?

She would soon find out.


	8. Family Matters

Days have passed and yet nothing had changed, Regan was still captured, James and Giuseppe haven’t been able to get out there and rescue her, they were waiting on more officers to arrive in Glenn Jean to make this a full blown case, so they had permission to start their search. Things were different in West Virginia.  
Giuseppe had remembered his phone call with Regan’s parents, Tom and Amy. They were worried sick, not knowing whether their little girl was going to make it out of there, and they knew they needed to be there in case she did. Her father had high hopes, her mother however was always worried and panicking, her anxiety through the roof even if one of her daughters scraped their knees. She was told to stay put, not wanting to deal with the stress, causing a potential heart attack, so Tom would be going alone. He hadn’t enough money to fly out on his own, but James paid his way full, he knew the situation and was prepared to help out in any way he could.

~

They waited and waited, the days grew longer and the nights were shorter. How was that even possible? When you’re trying to rescue someone from potential death, the Earth worked in a mysterious way. James looked down at his watch and realized it was already evening time, where did the day go? He looked around him, watching out for other police officers, and Tom, who would be riding in one of them. He took a deep breath and let out a large sigh, closing his eyes and rubbing his temples, fearing this was just a waste of time.

“It’s alright buddy, even If we have to do this alone.” Giuseppe patted his shoulder gently, knowing how worried he was that this was going to bite him in the ass.

“How do I shake this overwhelming fear that we’re not gonna get to her in time? Okay, we get officers, now it’s time to hunt down this fucking cabin we may never find.” James took a seat on the hood of his police truck.

“How fucking big are these woods, really? They can’t stretch for miles upon miles, that would make no sense, how the woods are bigger than the god damn town itself? Something ain’t right.” Giuseppe crossed his arms, trying to picture the size of the woods, from the rumors, it was a large wooded area, people had gotten lost in there many times, some never came out.

“They say people died in there from getting lost. Or maybe Ogre and the other one just took them and murdered them in cold blood like their gonna do to Regan if we don’t get out there.” James slammed his hand on the hood of his truck, angry at how helpless he was being, he was a cop for fuck sake. He had to do something. “I’m not gonna sit here and wait.” He attempted to get in his truck and go but Giuseppe grabbed him and slammed him against the driver door.

“No! You’re not doing this right now. You go and get yourself killed or lost, then what? You just need to calm down, brother, we’ll figure it out. We know she’s not dead, he’s playing games with us, he wants us to find her, don’t you get it?”

“He wants to get us as close as possible, and then when he realizes we’re close he’s going to kill her, I can already see it. He doesn’t want us to find her and rescue her, he’s a mad man!” James knew Ogre too well, he was familiar with his antics, he was familiar with how crazy he was, Giuseppe wasn’t fully aware of the dangers this man caused Thurmond, even the whole state of, WV.

“Okay well regardless, we’ll make sure he doesn’t kill her, even if I have to get some snipers to hide in a nearby location to shoot on command if he attempted to hurt her.” Giuseppe tried reassuring James, which he appreciated. Maybe they can do this, maybe there is hope, but only one way of finding out.

A couple more hours passed, James and Giuseppe were inside eating and talking among themselves about random bullshit, Ahniah sat beside Giuseppe stealing fries off his plate, not caring about anything other than Regan’s safety.

“Guys I don’t think anyone’s coming…” Ahniah interrupted James and Giuseppe’s conversation, they went from laughing to sadness in a matter of seconds.

“I had a feeling the whole day.” James placed his hand on his chin, now playing with his food instead of eating it.

“Way to brighten the mood babe.” Giuseppe whispered to Ahniah, who rolled her eyes and got up. Before she could speak again, they heard sirens from outside, they all looked. Four police cars rolled up in the parking lot, James face lit up like a Christmas tree.

“Hah!” Giuseppe clapped in excitement. “Never lose hope guys.” They all walked outside, feeling a bit more at ease. 8 officers stepped out, and greeted one another firmly. Soon after a bit of conversation, another man stepped out of one of the cars, and older man. He wore a white t-shirt, torn pants, and converse. Like father-like daughter. His hair was down to his shoulders and had a sleeve of tattoos on his arm. He looked like your regular biker gang member. Not what they were expecting, they knew immediately he was Regan’s father, and went to introduce themselves happily.

“You must be Tom. I’m Officer Duval, and this is my partner Officer Andrews and his girlfriend, Ahniah.” James shook Tom’s hand pleasantly.

“Nice to meet you all, I’m Regan’s father, I’m here for one reason and that’s to get my baby back from whoever those lunatics are.” He seemed very eager to help them in any way necessary, even if that means jumping in front of bullets or taking stabs to the chest, he would do anything to protect his youngest daughter, he wasn’t going down without a fight.

“We ride out in the A.M, bright and early, we’ll be out looking for the whole day, are you prepared?” Giuseppe asked, already knowing Tom’s answer.

“Are you kidding me, gentlemen? I was born ready to take down anyone who hurts my baby. Let’s fucking do this.” They all high-fived one another, and got ready for their biggest hunt in Glenn Jean history. This time, there was going to be hell to pay.  
No one was ready for what was about to happen.


	9. Together We Will

Everyone prepared themselves for the biggest mission in all of Glen Jean and Thurmond history. They were ready to once and for all rid the town of the monsters who lived there, they called Ogre and John the wooded creatures of the night. That’s exactly what they were, wooded monsters who preyed upon the weak, stole people’s lives and dignity and loved every moment of it. Nothing was going to go as planned, nothing was going to go right, things were going to be bad, a lot of things were going to go wrong, but it wasn’t a matter of things not going to plan, it was a matter of getting a young woman out of the woods alive, and as far away from West Virginia as possible.  
Everyone was in position ready to head out. Ahniah leaned up against a podium, arms crossed and filled with obvious rage that she was being forced to stay out of it. But this wasn’t her mission, and she needn’t get hurt as well if anything really bad happened. She rolled her eyes and tried pleading with James, then Giuseppe, a back and forth game of no’s and pleases.

“You aren’t, that’s final.” James placed his hand on his gun holster out of habit, and walked away from Ahniah who wasn’t taking no for an answer.

“I’m strong enough to handle my own. I don’t need you protecting me, just let me come, let me be a part of rescuing my friend.” James tried opening his driver seat door, but Ahniah slammed it shut, it seemed she wasn’t letting them go anywhere until they agreed to let her go. Giuseppe tried reasoning with her.

“If we need any more help, I’ll walkie you to come out. But you aren’t putting yourself at risk for a potentially life threatening mission.” Giuseppe kissed her forehead, and stared deep into her eyes, hoping she’d stop being stubborn and agree with him, luckily she did, after a moment of hesitation.

“Fine…” She walked back to the podium and leaned on it again, this time looking calmer, but more afraid. The thought of her boyfriend and best friend riding out into miles of just woods was scary to her. She didn’t know if they would get lost or captured themselves. Cops or not, things do happen, bad things were bound to happen, as a matter of fact it was guaranteed, but whether she liked it or not, a part of their job description was putting their lives at risk to save others, it’s why she knew they would be heroes in the end, no matter what happened.

“We’ll be okay, baby I promise.” Giuseppe blew Ahniah a kiss as they drove off into dawn. She watched them until their vehicles were no longer in eye sight, and walked to her house in distress.

_._

Regan had about an hours’ worth of sleep since being captured. She looked like she had just crawled out of hell after being there for years, with no water, no sleep, no energy. She was a raggedy mess. She had wearing the same red dress she put on, for 3 days, she gave up on showering, and mostly just laid around waiting to be raped again or talked down to, or even killed. She was surprised she wasn’t dead already, and had no idea why they kept her for so long without killing her, they must have had objectives, reasons for capturing her, at least Ogre. He hadn’t bothered her in a couple of days, but it was only a matter of time before she jinxed it. He was gone again, he normally stayed out for hours just patrolling the woods for anyone who could be lurking about, he knew at some point there was going to be a search party out looking for Regan, that was his main focus, to make sure no one got to her. He had her phone clutched to his hands, waiting for another phone call, so he could make things more interesting. He knew someone would eventually call.  
John sat down on the dirty couch in his living area, drinking beer and smoking a blunt, trying not to think of the girl in the room behind him, clinging to life. She grew sicker and sicker, looked like a mess, he noticed she had no life left in her, and she was just done with everything. She had no motivation to get out of there anymore, and took everything that was done to her, whether it was painful or not. He knew he was half at fault for her acting this way, she didn’t have the energy to fight, but that’s exactly what he wanted her to do, was the fight, was to prove to Ogre that she wasn’t going down without a fight. Ogre was the type of person who loved a good fight, he loved seeing dominance in a woman, made it harder for him wanting to kill that person. Might have made it easier for him to want them sexually, but to kill them? Dominance was the key to survival.  
John knew he couldn’t hold back anymore. He knew he couldn’t let Ogre come back and hurt her any longer, he knew that something had to be done, he wanted to help her and that’s exactly what he was going to do. He got up and threw his beer and blunt on the ground and walked into her room. She was lying on the ground, fetal position, her hair was covering her face, but you could tell she was crying from her hair being stuck onto her face like glue. She was dirty, her dress was ripped and she had scratches all over her body, but in some weird way, John felt so attracted to her, he felt a connection with her, that made him want to help her. He knew he had to do something.

“Regan.”

She squinted her eyes open and looked at John’s face, he was blurry to her. She moved the strands of sticky hair out of her face and rubbed her eyes, she could see him clearly now.

“Hurry up, sit straight. I’m helping you get out of here.”  
She shot straight up. Her body ached from doing that, her eyes clenched shut from the pain and she made a grunting noise that made John cringe. He could see the desperation of wanting to escape in her eyes, even though the motivation wasn’t there anymore, maybe he could bring that motivation back. He tried helping her stand up, she was so weak, her legs wobbled around, her knees were scrapped up, and her feet had swelled up a little bit, but she managed to stand up straight. John took a moment to let her adjust, she stretched, and brushed off any leaves and dirt she could get off. John stared at her in grace. She was tall, taller than him. She had beautiful long brown hair that was an obvious clump of a mess, but it didn’t matter to him. She was gorgeous, from the moment he laid eyes on her, he knew there was something about her that drew him in. He never acted that way towards women, and knew that if Ogre found out he had these feelings, he’d just knock John into another dimension, or kill him.

“How do you plan on helping me escape, Ogre would never allow this to happen. He’d just re-capture me and probably kill us both.” Regan asked, still groaning in pain, but it was bearable enough.

“I’m not staying here either, we’re escaping together.” His face spoke with more emotion than Regan ever saw. His eyes glistened. She didn’t quite know what he meant by escaping together, she never saw John as a prisoner here, but another person who worked closely with Ogre in making people’s lives as miserable as possible.

“I’ve seen terrible things; I’ve lived through it. I’ve done terrible things. But I never, I repeat… NEVER killed anyone.” John’s voice cracked. He was desperate to prove to Regan he wasn’t the evil creature people thought out of him to be. She didn’t understand him yet.

“Than what was your moral here?” She asked. She looked at him, hoping to get the answers she deserved.

“I don’t know. I didn’t really have any morals. I was following Ogre’s orders. He captured you, I put you in this room, I chained you up, and left you here, begging him not to kill you. He would have by now if it wasn’t for me.”

“Why didn’t you let him kill me?”

“I like you that’s why, can’t you see that?” It finally came out. John didn’t know what made him say it, but he did. He knew he could never say those words in front of Ogre, for John had many secrets but this one was to stay a secret forever if he wanted to survive. “I felt awful for what he had done, I wanted your pain to rub off on me so you wouldn’t have to feel it anymore. I’m not just his roommate, Regan. I’m a prisoner too.” A tear fell from his face; she could see his hands trembling. Her eyes went wide. She could see everything crystal clear. It was finally starting to make sense.

“What has he done to you?” Regan’s voice filled with rage.

“Everything he’s done to you.” John looked away, embarrassed.

“He raped you?”

“Too many times to count.” He spoke softly. Regan’s mouth opened, her hands covering it. “He’s beaten me, raped me, almost killed me, hit me with a baseball bat so many times I was unconscious for days, he’s left me to starve, left me dehydrated, made fun of me, tried getting me to do his dirty work and threatened to behead me if I didn’t follow through with his orders.”  
She felt helpless, she knew he wanted to help her, but something inside of her wanted to help him. They were planning on escaping together, she wanted to get him as far from Ogre as possible, she always knew John wasn’t the bad guy, he was forced to do these bad things, to keep them both alive, she could see in his eyes he meant those things he said, about liking her and wanting to keep her safe. She felt comforted for the first time in almost a week of being captured.

“Let’s get out of here, together.” Regan walked up to John and took his hands, they immediately stopped trembling. “The outcome doesn’t matter to me; we will not let him get away with this.”  
John loved the determination in her, the motivation was back, it excited him. They both smiled, the first time they ever saw each other genuinely smile. He felt like he couldn’t hold back from kissing her, but didn’t want to start something that could end right away if Ogre were to find them. But he didn’t want to think of the bad, this was a mission to save Regan, to save himself.  
He took the key to unlock Regan’s chains that were around her ankles, and chucked them to the side. Feeling free, she found her shoes and threw them on. He took her hand gently and made their way to the front door. John pushed her away out of outdoors view to see if he spotted Ogre. He wasn’t anywhere in eye sight, but John knew he had to be very careful with where they went. He had a knife in his pocket just in case anything went wrong, but knew deep down it wasn’t going to be enough. Ogre wasn’t almost invincible. They carefully made their way outside. Regan felt a hard breeze flow threw her hair, it was so cold and felt so amazing. She closed her eyes and leaned her head up towards the sky, taking a deep breath in. Being outside never made her so emotional. There was something so beautiful about the outdoors, the woods were a beautiful place indeed, so open, you could fit multiple homes in it. But being captured made it less beautiful and more horrifying. John looked at her in sorrow, knowing how important this moment was for her. Their hands were locked, he didn’t want to let go of her, she didn’t want to let go of him, their linked fingers were each other’s safe place.

He couldn’t take it anymore, he grabbed the back of her head and kissed her passionately, sending a jolt of lightning between them that Regan never felt before. But mostly, why would anyone want to kiss her when she looked like a crack head who didn’t shower for days? The heat of the moment made neither of them care what the other looked like. John had been craving this for what felt like an eternity, and knew if they were going to die, they were going to go out like this, confessing their feeling for one another in a kiss that they wanted to last a lifetime. They stopped, trying to catch their breath, John’s eyes stared into hers like it was made to be. He smiled and she loved it, she didn’t think she would but there was something so striking about John that was so attractive to her, emotionally and physically. But alas, they knew all good things must come to an end, so they could embark on their next journey to making it out of the woods alive, or at least try to. As they grabbed each other’s hand again, turning to make their way out of cabin’s view, they were stopped in their tracks. In front of them stood Ogre, feet spread apart, arms crossed, with a faint smirk on his face that went from sarcastic to anger in seconds. He could see the fear in their eyes, that’s exactly what he wanted.

“I knew all along you went soft for her, but never in a million years did I think you’d pull this little stunt. Did you think I wouldn’t find out about it, did you think I’d let you escape with her? You’re funny, John. You’ve always been a jokester.”

“Ogre enough. I’m not letting you do this anymore. You wanna kill me, you wanna hurt me? Fine. Let Regan go.” John pushed Regan behind him, she clutched onto the back of his shirt, not wanting to let him go, after all, he was her safe place.

“You got her all lovely dovey for you now, I can’t let either one of you leave. You got her thinking you actually care about you, but you know you don’t. You know you want to see her suffer as much as I do. Oh Regan darling, don’t you see he did this purposely?” Ogre laughed. John mouth dropped.

“No, Regan I didn’t. I honestly want you to be safe, I would never put you in harm’s way purposely. I just out myself at risk too, I’m willing to take the punishment for your safety. Don’t believe him.” John pleaded to Regan, who knew Ogre was lying.

“Ogre, shut the fuck up.” Regan stepped out in front of John, and walked up to Ogre, fearless. John wanted to pull her away, but this new fearlessness made him so proud.

“Oh there’s that dominance I love so much. Might just let you live a little longer.” Ogre grabbed her hand tightly, she tried getting out of his grip but he was too strong. John ran up to him and tried punching him but Ogre was too quick and hit him so hard he fell to the ground in pain. He held his face and looked up at Ogre, who grabbed him too and dragged them both back inside. He effortlessly placed them back into the room Regan was in and watched them hold themselves in pain.

“Guess I won’t be going back out anytime soon, now I gotta keep my eyes on both of you? I’m disappointed John, you’re letting love get in the way of our job. The man downstairs won’t be awarding you this time.” Ogre sighed in a sarcastic tone.

“You’re psycho.” Regan groaned, inching her way to John, who was lying on his side.

“You’re next.” He grinned, before grabbing the chains and placing one on Regan’s ankle, and one on John’s.

“So what, now you’re kidnapping me too, huh you piece of shit!” John screamed in Ogre’s face, but nothing seemed to faze him.

“Oh John, you’re so blind, I was always your captor. Always.” Ogre winked before slamming the door shut behind him. John didn’t know what to say. He knew all along he was a prisoner, but hearing it from Ogre’s mouth made it worse. He leaned back against the wall behind him and placed his face in his hands. They were both in trouble, big trouble.

“Regan I’m so sorry I got us into this mess, I’m sorry for whatever is about to happen, just know I truly care about you and wanted you to be safe. Please forgive me.” John’s face was wet from tears, as he looked at Regan with horrible guilt. She didn’t speak, instead she went to John and hugged him tightly, not letting go. They would go down together. Who would have thought Regan would feel this way about her captor?  
But he wasn’t her captor anymore, he was a prisoner like her, but she wasn’t letting it end like this. They WERE going to get out alive, she just needed a plan. But now she had John, and two great minds will always think alike.


	10. Into The Woods

James felt like he was driving for hours. He was nervous, sweating, and didn’t have much to say on his journey to Thurmond. He knew this was it, it was a do or die situation. He wasn’t sure if he and his men were going to be able to pull this off, but he was willing to put everything on the line, including his life, to save a girl he cared for, whether he barely knew her or not. Giuseppe noticed his anxiousness, and tried calming him down the best way he could.

“Ok, turn on some music or something, get some heavy metal into your blood, that’ll motivate you.”

“Can’t, won’t.” Was all James could spit out at the moment. Giuseppe rolled his eyes, then continued looking out the window. They knew they were coming close to Thurmond, everything was turning into woods and trees. The trees were so high they covered the blue sky, the illusion being it was becoming night time when in reality it was 8 in the morning, and they were all jittery on coffee and adrenaline.

“Nothing like acres of woods to get us wonderin’.” Giuseppe sighed to himself.

“Yeah, like have we already passed her, is she somewhere in there, or are we doing this for nothing?” James put a hand on his forehead, resisting the urging headache.

“You are just full of negativity, my friend. We know she’s in there. We will get her, if you have some sort of faith left in you.”

“Faith isn’t what I’m leaning towards, I just want to be able to successfully do my job, we’ve had so many cases like this, not as bad, and even than I couldn’t save them all. What kind of policeman am I if I can’t save people?”  
Giuseppe gazed on James, not looking away, he knew how serious this was to him, and made it seem like a joke, Giuseppe was like that, tried finding the brighter side of the darkest things, sometimes he needed to take James more seriously to get through to him.

“Pull over fast.” Giuseppe pointed to the side of the road, where James complied immediately. Giuseppe took a deep breath and put a hand on James’ shoulder.

“Look buddy, you are amazing at your job, you’re the chief, you’re the big guns, you’re the man of the hour. Well… Every god damn mother fuckin’ hour.” He grinned. James couldn’t help but chuckle. “I know you care for this girl, and you wanna make sure she’s safe. You’re right though, WE can’t save everyone, but we try, and that’s good enough. We care enough about complete strangers to go on out there and put their lives in our hands because that’s what the fuck we do, we help people, maybe we can’t save ‘em all, but we do what we can cos we’re carin’ people.” James nodded, he knew Giuseppe was right, they couldn’t save everyone, no officer in the world can go out and save everyone, but they can come close, some police officers can’t even save themselves because they’re too busy trying to save everyone else. He respected that.

“You will find that motivation, and I can see you’re willing to put it all on the line to save this damsel in distress. So strap on your big boy boots, keep your hand on that holster, think of how proud you’ll be when you throw that mother fucker, Ogre on death row, and save your woman.” Giuseppe roughly patted James’ shoulder before James could smile, finally seeing that brighter side Giuseppe always looked for.

“Alright.” James took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment before turning the truck back and seeing a better perspective on things. He looked over at Giuseppe and patted a hand on his back, thanking him for the pep talk, which he definitely needed. He headed back out onto the road and made continued onto their big mission.  
_._

They arrived at Thurmond just before 8:40 A.M. The dirt roads were a lot dirtier than before. It was a ghost town for sure, they could see just how empty it truly was. What was Regan thinking moving into a place like this? This was kidnap central. She never seemed scared, or nervous. James could tell now just how brave she was, being in Thurmond made his skin crawl like nothing else. But he had bigger things to worry about than how empty the place was.  
Up ahead a half a mile lay the five houses he was familiar with. Some of them were so worn down they looked like they were getting ready to collapse. Two hours, including that of Regan’s, looked brand new, like someone recently renovated. James remembered a set of younger relatives of the original owners came in to make the houses less ghostly. He had just been to Thurmond a week prior, but things seemed more eerie than ever before, this time he knew Regan was missing, and knew this time he was there for a bigger purpose.  
Giuseppe and James stepped out of the truck after parking near Regan’s vacant home. James stared at the home for a moment and placed his hands on his waste, thinking of what could have been if she was here, maybe things would have been better, maybe they would have gotten closer. Thoughts kept circling his mind, making it hard to focus, until Giuseppe walked over with an intense proposition.

“James, focus. Remember what I said.” Giuseppe started. “Now look, I had an idea, it’s kind of a big one so hear me out.” He continued, James gave him a side eye, as Giuseppe pulled out his phone, James knew exactly where he was going with this.

“You want me to call him?” Asked before Giuseppe could begin to speak.

“Scare him. Let him know we have an army of men. Hell, try staying on the phone with him while we scope the woods. But use my phone, he knows your number now.” Giuseppe held out his phone, James hesitated. He knew it was a good plan, but was also nervous, this plan could take a wrong turn and it would all be over. But it was better than nothing. He took Giuseppe’s phone and dialed the number before signaling his men to head for the woods.  
Giuseppe took out his gun and began walking with James to the woods, Regan’s father running up to join them, holding a pocket knife he carried with him at all times. Him and Regan had the same exact one, James noticed.

“You sure you’re secure enough? A pocket knife seems.. I don’t know, not safe enough.”

“I can handle my own, Officer. My adrenaline is through the roof right now, only thing I care about is my daughter’s safety. Now let’s go get that son of a bitch.” Tom spoke loud and clear, giving James and Giuseppe this new found energy to get this mission started. As they began at the start of the woods, James hit the call button and held the phone to his ear. At first there was no answer, and James didn’t want to continue trying, after two tries he started giving the phone back to Giuseppe, until the phone rang. They stopped and looked at one another, while Tom looked at them, urging James to answer it.

“Hello?” He spoke clearly in his low voice.

“Ah, Officer James what a coincidence. I was just thinking about you.” Ogre’s voice was all too familiar to James. His anger started getting the best of him, but he didn’t say anything, he wanted to try keeping Ogre on the phone as long as possible, hoping he might be able to track where Regan’s phone was coming from.

“You know, our last phone call was so short, we barely got to ask how each other’s days were going.”

“Enough, Ogre. You know why I’m calling, so let’s get straight to it.”

“Oh but I don’t know why you’re calling, I thought maybe you just wanted to see how I was doing, honestly.”

“No, I’m calling to let you know.. WE’RE COMING.”  
_._

“Oh really?” Ogre smirked. He didn’t believe it, but he was about to. He walked over to Regan’s room, and watched her closely, she tried not looking at him, and looked over at John who managed to fall asleep, on his side, chain wrapped around him tightly, it couldn’t have been comfortable. She placed her hand on his arm, caressing it, trying to wake him, she knew Ogre was on the phone with someone she knew, it was her phone he was using after all.

“Oh dear, Officer James you really don’t know me after all do you. You really think Regan will be alive if you manage to find me?”

“Yes she will, you don’t have the balls to kill her, If you did you would have by now.” James was speaking so loudly Regan could hear him. Ogre walked into Regan’s room, now standing inches from her.

“I got your girl right here Officer. Sitting right below me. Looking up at me like a lost puppy dog. Really sexy if you ask me, how she begs with her eyes.” Ogre winked at her. She spat at his shoes. But he payed no attention.

“Leave her alone. She is an innocent person who didn’t do anything to you. If you give her to me safely, I’ll consider going easy on you.” James lied, he would never.

“Nice try, Officer, but even I’m smart enough to know that’s not true. But I feel very confident that you will not find me.”

“What about the other one, your accomplice?”

“Oh you mean the lover boy, the one who got Regan to fall madly in love with him? I have him chained up to, they’re sitting next to each other, he’s fun to mess around with too, except he takes it better than Regan does.” Ogre laughed, sitting crisscross in front of John, who was just barely awake. He looked up at Ogre with blurred eyes, anger in his face. He tried moving but he was chained up worse than Regan, she was more free to move around than he was.

“Stop this.” He whispered to Ogre, but he didn’t pay attention.

“Wait, he and Regan are mutual with one another? How, he is as horrible as you are.” James had this confused expression, Giuseppe looked at him dumbfounded.

“Oh you’re missing out on so much, friend.”

“DO NOT CALL ME YOUR FRIEND, I WILL NEVER. YOU BETTER NOT LAY A HAND ON HER.” Giuseppe stopped James from getting too worked up, he knew that would end badly. It could ruin everything.

“Calm down.” Giuseppe spoke just loud enough for James to hear. They were getting deeper in the woods now, but Ogre continued chuckling.

“Listen to your friend there, James. He seems rather smart. You better calm down, don’t want the wood creatures coming for ya.”

“Put Regan on the phone.” James stopped. He wasn’t moving until he heard her voice. “Now.”  
Ogre stayed silent for a moment, he stared at Regan for what felt like an eternity before speaking again. “Why would I do that?” He asked, emotionless.

“You afraid?” James asked, a genuine smile on his face, he could see he was getting to Ogre, slowly but surely.

“No, I don’t get scared, nothing frightens me. Not you, or your army of men dumb enough to enter the woods to find someone you won’t ever find.” Ogre handed Regan the phone and watched her closely. John inched closer to her to try and listen in.

“James?” She spoke softly.  
James bent down on his knees and tried holding in his emotions, it felt so good to hear her voice.

“Regan, oh my God.” He sobbed.

“James what’s going on, are you okay, are you trying to find me?” She asked, looking at John, and refusing to look at Ogre, no matter the temptation.

“We’re in the woods now, we had set up this plan days ago, we won’t stop ‘til we find you, you’re gonna be okay I promise, he won’t kill you.” James got up and continued walking, he felt more at ease hearing her voice. But Regan’s tone grew fiercer. She got up on her knees and looked Ogre dead in his face.

“Great, but I’ll make it easier, me and… A friend are gonna escape this place very soon, don’t worry, we’ll meet in the middle, after we kill this fucking FUCK.” She spoke, middle finger inches from his face. Ogre’s face went from sarcastically amused to pissed off in a matter of moments. He could hear James’ laughter on the other end, and immediately spoke.

“She just made this ten times harder for you, James. Good luck, and let the fucking games begin.” Ogre hung up the phone, and smacked Regan in the face with it.

_UMF_

“Hey!” John tried grabbing Ogre with his free hand but Ogre already left the room.

“Stop! Don’t. I’m fine.” Regan picked herself up and placed a hand on John’s. They gazed at one another and then began grinning. “Where did this fearlessness come from?” John curiously asked, loving this new found confidence.

“You.” She kissed him gently and looked out the door to see if Ogre was in eye sight, he wasn’t. But she could hear him rustling through things, trying to find something. Soon he entered the room again, holding a spiked bat that John hadn’t seen in forever.

“Ogre!” John screamed, covering Regan from any harm he was about to cause her.

“Ogre pushed John out of the way with this strength she’d never seen before. He grabbed Regan by the neck and held the bat close to her face.

“If you try to kill me, bitch.. I promise this will go in his face first, you can watch him slowly die a painful death, and then you’ll be next.” He was so close she could taste his obvious fear; she was also getting to him. Ogre was breaking down. They were truly coming to rescue her now, he had something to worry about, whether he showed it or not.  
He got up and left the room, shutting the door behind them, leaving them in pitch black darkness. John managed to find Regan, and lay his head on her lap. She rubbed his head and leaned back against the wall, things were finally getting real, this was officially a life or death mission, and they knew Ogre wasn’t going down without a fight. What were they going to do next?


	11. Survival Mode

It felt like an eternity in the woods, too many lefts and rights, and circles around the perimeter, nothing seemed to be getting accomplished. James was tired, he could see everyone else was as well, but they knew they couldn’t give up, not now. Not ever. They could feel the temptation rising in their blood, the satisfaction of knowing they could save a girl from someone who never feared anyone, who would kill anyone just because he knew he could get away with it. James could feel the tension between himself and Tom, as frustrated as he was, he wanted his daughter to be okay, he relied on James to get the job done. James did everything he could in the days leading up to this. He and Giuseppe had tried making this mission as successful as possible, blueprinting, and mapping out guidelines, anything they could think of, they needed to get this done. Things weren’t ending so quickly, no matter how tired they were, James, and Giuseppe were determined to get the job done no matter how long it took.

“We better be getting there soon, god damn it, this is getting ridiculous.” Tom stopped, putting his hands on his knees, he was losing breath fast. He was an old man who wasn’t used to all the walking, but knew he couldn’t stop.

“I’m sorry, Sir. But we don’t know just how many miles these woods go on for, but I promise we’ll get there eventually, just try to stay focused and that’ll give you more adrenaline.” Giuseppe tried helping Tom get back on his two feet, but Tom pushed him away, signaling that he didn’t need anyone’s help.

“Boy I have a story to tell my wife when I get back.”  
_._

“God stop! Get off me you fucking pig!” Regan shouted out, she was dragged to a corner of her room, it was still pitch black, she couldn’t see a damn thing, only felt the cold, clammy hands of Ogre trying to undress her. No one could see anything, so Ogre had to feel her up before finding which article of clothing he was touching before ripping them off so hard the tearing noises could be heard from miles away.

“Ogre! Leave her alone, you wanna mess with someone than mess with me, not her.” John’s voice begged out, leaving the room in a silence for what felt like a lifetime. Ogre had to contemplate, he had two people, two victims, he never felt so powerful, he was never alone when it came to moments like this. He always had John to pick up the missing pieces. It took Ogre a minute to realize that John was the last missing piece to this never ending puzzle of mystery.

“Shut your mouth, boy. Before I sew it shut.” Ogre didn’t want to listen anymore though; he wasn’t going to let John control him. He was now on a lookout for whatever they were planning, since working together now was an obvious thing. He knew he needed to have both eyes open at all costs, to be ten steps ahead of the both of them, he wasn’t going to show them that he was mentally breaking down from this, he wasn’t going anywhere, he wasn’t going to prison, he wasn’t going to be killed. He was Ogre, he always had a plan for everything.  
He got on his knees and pushed Regan down on the ground, finding her neck and holding her, but not too rough. He didn’t want to kill her yet, this could be a fun experience in Ogre’s eyes, keeping her alive just long enough, then killing her at the last minute in front of everyone, showing them just how serious he was about killing her. John, James, Giuseppe, they all imagined him to be just talk, but no action. But in this case, Ogre would prove them wrong, it was only a matter of time before they eventually found the cabin, Ogre almost wanted to make it easier on them to speed up the process. He was anxiously awaiting their arrival.  
John could hear her struggling to breathe, he could hear her gasping, he could hear her trying to get him off her, his whole body weight just laying on her, it was pure torture to the ears. He covered them, his knees up to his chest, or as high as he could get them before the chains began causing him pain, he didn’t care however, he was helpless, feeling like he was a lost cause for trying to save someone he cares for. He knew saying something wouldn’t stop it, that it would only make it worse. He could hear Ogre ripping her clothes off, and felt the floor creaking, John knew exactly what he was doing. He could hear Regan’s agonizing grunts, which Ogre loved. But he couldn’t do anything about it. He had to hear Regan being raped once again, and this time he couldn’t leave. Tears flowed down from his face, the whimpers began coming from his mouth, he held himself together trying not to let Ogre hear him, John crying was almost a fetish of Ogre’s, licking his tears and begging for more made Ogre absolutely sick. But John knew he had to be strong for her, they had plans, and he knew Regan purposely took anything Ogre gave to her for the sake of both of their survival.  
_._

“Are we getting close yet?” Giuseppe asked, noticing something new. A tree with blood stains on it.

“That is new indeed.” James looked, taking out a glove and inspecting it, it was dry. “Must have been there for a while, kind of looks like a hand print, yeah?” He looked closer.

“Hers?” Giuseppe put his hands on his hips, his eyes growing weary.

“Maybe, so we keep following this track, and don’t turn around, anyone!” He yelled out to the other officers who were just up ahead, with their snipers and pistols clutched to their hands.

“She’s in full on survival mode right now, she knows what she has to do to stay alive, even if that means throwing herself in harm’s way, she’s smart. She’s got this.” James nodded, trying to reassure himself and Tom that things were going to be okay.

“I trust you, we made it this far, we can make it further.” Tom sighed out, as tired as he was, he knew he would be just fine seeing his baby girl alive and well.

“Survival mode, good term.” Giuseppe grinned. Always trying to make light of the situation.

“I don’t think anyone’s been this deep in the woods besides them.” James was always curious about how many people have really been in here, and if anyone at all managed to make their way out. Couldn’t have, by all the rumors going around, it seemed Ogre got to all of them, he was like a snake, always eating whatever prey he came upon, no matter who or what it was. It was like Ogre wasn’t even human.

“He could be some sort of mutant?” Giuseppe seriously asked.

“Shut up.” James pushed him away, trying not to get caught up in any of his playful antics. “We got work to do, we’re so close. Let’s get there, and hopefully by tonight, or morning we’ll be there. Ready to win this war.”

“You’re the boss.” Giuseppe placed his hand on his gun holster, as they continued walking, and not stopping.


	12. A Taste For Blood

They were so close they could taste it. The atmosphere began feeling a bit more sinister, like they had a feeling something wasn’t right, they could almost smell blood in the air, whatever metallic smell it was, was more than unpleasant. James held his hand to his gun holster very tightly, feeling more uneasy the more they walked. The sun had officially fallen, the moon was showing but it wasn’t exactly pitch black yet either, the sun was down but you could see it yet in the horizon, becoming dimer and dimer. Soon they would have no natural light and would have to convert to using their flashlights, which was another challenge they had to face. They knew using up too much light would result in the batteries dying too quickly, and then there would be a bigger issue.

“Should we camp out ‘til mornin’?” Giuseppe asked, stopping and placing his hands on his hips. Everyone looked at him like he had ten eyes.

“You’re fuckin’ balls to the wall.” Tom shouted. James chuckled, he hadn’t heard that one before.

“Whatever that meant, I agree. We have a killer on the loose, and you want us to camp out in the woods he lives in? No.” James continued walking ahead of everyone, but he could tell people were tired, but there was no time to stop, any moment something could go wrong, Regan wasn’t safe, regardless of whether Ogre would kill her or not, James didn’t want to take the chance of her getting hurt and him not being able to get there in time to stop it.

“Our men are exhausted, we’ve been walking for hours, James.” Giuseppe tried catching up with him to reason with him on why they needed a break. But James was shocked he even wanted to break to begin with.

“You wanna break? Fine, if you people want to take a fucking break go for it! But I’m NOT.” James flicked his wrist and continued on, leaving everyone to hesitate on whether or not to stop or follow him. But no one wanted James to go off by himself, that was a death wish. Tom chased after him as Giuseppe watched, he knew James was frustrated and wanted to prove to everyone he could save someone, he didn’t even know if James was doing this because he cared about Regan at this point, to Giuseppe, James only saw this as a game. A dangerous one at that, but he decided to keep going, no point in stopping when the leader if off putting his life at risk.

“Alright, well sooner or later we have to at least take a breather, but when you’re ready, alright?” Giuseppe patted James’ back.

“I’m not trying to be a dick, I just want to find her is all, I really wanna find her.”

“Why do you wanna find my girl so bad, officer?” Tom butted in, his arms were crossed from the cold wind blowing on him, his eyes narrowed, looking at James curiously.

“Well sir, he was supposed to go on a date with her but she never showed, so at that moment he knew something was wrong, no one blows this guy off.” Giuseppe answered for James, laughing out loud, making James clench his eyes shut in embarrassment.

“Oh really now?” Tom batted his eyelashes, making James’ cheeks turn red.

“I’d rather not get into it. It’s nothing really.”

“Well obviously it’s something, you wanna be the guy who saves the damsel in distress, and in this case, it’s my daughter.” Tom smiled, he knew he couldn’t give James a hard time, he was doing a great thing for someone, even if he barely knew much about her, he still cared, he liked her, he wanted her to know he wasn’t going down without a fight.  
_._

An hour had passed since the sun officially had went down, and the flashlights came out. Things were starting to become more eerie. Giuseppe had gone up ahead to scout with the snipers, while James and the rest of the flock headed north towards a huge hill that you could see everything from. To James that was a great sign, maybe they’d see something worth finding from the hill, or maybe they were putting themselves on notice, since the hill was so large and recognizable. He took a pair of binoculars from his police mates bag and started looking, hoping he could see something from the darkness, but nothing was really showing up, curse the damn nighttime.

“Boss!” James heard Giuseppe yelling from up ahead, it sounded like something was wrong, like something had caught his attention, he scurried down the hill and ran to Giuseppe as fast as he could, forgetting his agenda on the hill.

“What is it, Andrews?”

“Look, boss. Look.” Giuseppe pointed to an old oak tree, it was old and looked like it was ready to collapse at any moment. Giuseppe pointed his flashlight on it when James’ mouth dropped to the ground.

_There once was a girl named Regan_  
Who sat in a room so damp and old  
She died in there and no one could find her  
Her bones all shriveled up and cold 

The poem was written in blood, so clearly written.

“That blood looks fresh, it’s still dripping, he was here just recently, he knows we’re here. He can probably see us, keep a look out and get to that fucking cabin!” James and the rest of the crew ran as fast as they could up ahead, they knew they were close, but they knew they were being watched. Ogre was a mad man, he could see everything, he had eyes like a hawk. He found them before they could find him, but that only meant that they were so close. So very close. James could feel his adrenaline pumping and was finally going to make something of himself, he was going to kill Ogre. There was no turning back, there was no mercy on his soul, there was only Ogre bleeding on the ground, begging for his life, and James shoving a knife right through his head. That was satisfying, that was James’ victory.  
They would get there come morning, and everything was about to change, and just as James thought things were going to get easier, Ogre dropped a major bombshell on them, this was a war now, a battle of survival, this was going to be a blood bath, and boy was everyone prepared. It was time to end this crazy lunatic once a for all, for Regan.


	13. Arrows

James could feel how close he was getting to the cabin. His blood was boiling, his adrenaline was going nuts, those were usual feelings of dread and despair, but this time this feeling was different. This feeling was of determination and success, something he hadn’t felt in quite a while.

“Did you have a plans on what the fuck we’re gonna do once we actually get there, James?” Giuseppe asked, his voice lowered a bit, fearing they were being watched and listened to.

“Are you scared, Officer Andrews?” James stopped suddenly, feeling like he was the only one who really wanted to do this, and that everyone else was there just as a backup precaution.

“You guys could stay in the bushes while I go in there alone, maybe to never come out? Is that where we’re going with this, G.?”

“No! I’m only saying- “

“You’re only saying you’re worried that this isn’t going to go as planned, and none of us could make it out of here alive. I know that, I’m aware of the risks we’re taking. I’m doing this with or without any of you. Hear me?”  
All the police officers, including Giuseppe looked at each other with worry in their eyes, that maybe James was going a little crazy trying to save this girl when things could go very wrong, but they were a part of the force for a reason, to save people, to protect the innocent, and they weren’t about to stop now.  
_._

They could smell blood in the air, it smelt like old copper, and made everyone gag. Giuseppe covered his nose with both hands as he walked closely behind James and Tom, before everyone jolted to a stop after hearing the bushes rustling over and over again, there was no wind blowing, but the smell of blood could easily be smelled, and it was strong.

“Do you think there are bodies?” Giuseppe asked, James didn’t know what to say. Were there?

“Perhaps, or maybe it’s just the cabin, the smell is telling us we’re right there, right on the tip of the iceberg, we’re there. So close…” James just wanted to be there already, he wanted this war to end, this was becoming less of a game, and more of a survival match.  
James looked at the trees around them, blood spots on all of them, symbols and signs that looked almost like arrows, directions maybe.

“Do you think Ogre is leading us to him?” Giuseppe shined his flashlight at the arrows on the trees, wondering what it meant.

“He could be leading us into a trap, I don’t think we should be following them, we’re doing fine on our own, I’m done playing games.” James stopped looking at kept walking, trying not to pay attention to the symbols, but something in the back of his mind knew something bad was about to happen, it was just a matter of what, and when.  
James took out his flashlight and shined it up ahead, noticing something in the near distance. He tried to make out what it was, inching his way closer but not getting too close in case it was a trap. When he finally noticed what was up ahead he stopped in his tracks, everyone stopping immediately after him. His eyes widened.

“Well shit in my mouth and call me Clara…” Giuseppe took a deep breath and put his hands on his hips, trying to keep calm, but his heart was racing a thousand miles a second. Everyone’s adrenaline went from 0 to 100 really quick, and James knew he had to come up with a plan, and fast.

“Everyone huddle up.” James gathered everyone in a tight circle, trying to talk a low as he could just in case they were being watched, which he knew they were.

"We know Ogre planned to have us come here, it’s obvious the arrows we saw were a way there, and that’s exactly what he wanted, he wants to play games.” James held his hand to his forehead, an instant headache approaching.

“Look, James. If it’s a game he wants to play, then let’s play. We are going to fight fire with fire, except we’re bringing torches.” Giuseppe patted James’ back, a friendly reminder that they were all in this together. “Remember, buddy, there’s 1 of him, and many of us.”

_Whistle_  
Whistle  
Whistle 

Everyone looked around, flashlights beaming bright. It was still pretty dark out, but they knew morning was approaching, and approaching fast, it was about 6 A.M, and James finally made it. He was going to finally rescue Regan. But he needed to survive in order to do that.

_I see you_  
I see all of you  
You’re not a match for me  
He may have softened up to her  
But I haven’t  
I may be a one-man band  
But when has that ever stopped me 

James could hear that eerie voice, he could smell the vile that came off his body, he could feel his presence.

“Stop hiding and face me.” James held his gun and kept his finger on the trigger. But no one answered back to him. He hated playing games, but knew the only way he’d make it in the cabin and save Regan was to play Ogre’s stupid games, and everyone had to play along too.

_Did you see the arrows_  
They aren’t what you think  
They weren’t directions 

“What are they then?” James asked, playing along, finger clutching the trigger.

Death.

James jaw dropped, before screaming out loud, until-

_THUNK_  
THUNK  
THUNK 

“EVERYONE MOVE!” James grabbed Giuseppe and Tom and hid behind a tree as they watched police officers drop to the ground, blood spewing out of their heads from being hit by arrows Ogre was shooting out, but where was he shooting them from?

“Fuck!” Giuseppe cried out, his hands covering his mouth, trying to shut himself up in case Ogre was hunting them, this time he felt entirely helpless, half his team was dead, and James knew this wasn’t a game after all, this was a war he planted himself into. He dropped to the ground and held his hands to his face, breathing heavily as Tom knelt down to try and calm him down.

“Can’t give up now, son. We have to get in there and save my girl, you know it, Officer Andrews know it, and I know it. So get up and let’s stop this bastard from hurting anymore people.” Tom picked James up off the ground and dusted him off. He had this no fear attitude, something James needed to be taught.

_Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha_

“Come out of the darkness, asshole! You’re nothing but a coward, you think that’s gonna stop us! Think again.” James shouted out, hoping it would provoke him enough to show his face. But there was only silence.  
“He has a crossbow, James. Careful.” Giuseppe pointed his gun out ahead of him, ready to shoot if necessary.

They could hear footsteps running back and forth as though Ogre was pacing, he wasn’t talking anymore, and within minutes the pacing halted. It grew quiet again as the James and the remaining officers finally stood in front of the cabin they had been desperately searching for, for years.

“Only when you’re really determined, will you find what you’re looking for.” Tom sighed out in relief, knowing that his daughter was only feet from him, alive. At least so he thought.

“Okay, since we can’t come up with a brilliant plan on the spot, we have no choice but to wing it, it’s starting to get lighter out, so we have an advantage, Ogre can’t stay hidden forever, he has to make himself known, he isn’t the type of psycho to stay in the shadows… No… He wants to make himself known.” James took out his rifle and placed it over his shoulder, his pistol in his other hand.

“We need to split up.” Giuseppe looked around at the other men, they all nodded. Knives, armor, and guns all out in the open, ready to win this blood bath war. Tom stood on the sidelines watching, when James walked up to him, offering him something incredible.

“Take the rifle, and go up on the hill behind you, if you spot Ogre, shoot him in the head. Understand me?” He held out his rifle, Tom’s eyes glistened with enjoyment, he never held a gun in his life, but damn it looked beautiful.

“You got it, chief.” Tom nodded before running to the hill behind him, doing whatever it took to rescue his little girl.  
_._

“Looks like we got company.” Ogre paced back and forth in the cabin, occasionally looking back at Regan and John, who were holding each other close. “Better fuck now while you can, once the suns out, you’ll both me dead.”

“What the fuck are you talking about, company?” John’s voice was filled with rage, he was over Ogre and wanted nothing more than to see him dead on the ground.

“Looks like Regan has loved ones after all, the police are here.” Ogre looked out the window, watching the cops scatter around the perimeter.

“WHAT?!” Regan pushed John to the side and stood up, as weak as she was, the chains holding her ankles down, but nothing else was holding her back.

“Regan…” John held her leg gently, she looked down at him, she could see he was dehydrated and weak to the point of passing out, but she needed to know what was going on.

“I can’t believe they found me… He really found me.” Regan finally managed to smile, the first smile in weeks. She almost felt safe, but knew this wasn’t over by a long shot.

“Their down 5 men. I arrowed them right in the head. With your crossbow, John.” Ogre laughed out loud, John couldn’t even function enough to respond to him, there was nothing he could do anyway, if Ogre was going down, so was John, just by association.

“John I won’t let them take you, I’ll say you tried to save me. They can’t just take you away, you’re just as much as a prisoner as I am.” Regan bent over to kiss John’s head. He pulled her down inches from his face. His eyes watery.

“No, let them take me. Let them kill me even.”

“What! No!”

“Regan, I was a part of this, I put you in this mess as much as him. I carried you here, I put those chains on you, I didn’t care…” Tears falling from his face.

“You’re not a bad guy, John, you were misunderstood. I know you weren’t gonna hurt me, cos if you wanted to you would have.”  
Ogre could hear their conversation, the more they talked, the angrier he got. He went out back and grabbed a shot gun before planning out what to do next.

“You’re right but look at me, I’m nothing but a worthless piece of shit who let him rape me and torture me just so I could live, I live in a rundown cabin in the woods for fuck sake. I’m a nothing. I’m good as dead already.” John’s sobs hurt Regan’s heart. She kissed him slowly, her hands caressing his face, he placed his hands on hers, before breaking the kiss to lay his forehead on hers. It was a moment worth living for, Regan wanted nothing more than to break free from this hell and take John with her, to start a new life.

“I love you, John.” She whispered to him before he gazed at her, opening his mouth to respond when all of a sudden a loud bang echoed from outside.

“Shit!” She fell back, covering her ears. John managed to crawl as far as he could to reach the door to his room to make out what was going on, the front door was wide open, but he heard nothing.  
“We’re in the danger zone, we need to find a way out of these chains.” John looked around, trying to find something to break the chains. But there was nothing.  
_._

“I’ll give you a chance to come out or I start shooting. Hear me? Come out and talk to me like a man, and surrender yourself.” James shouted out, so loud Regan could hear him.

“JAMES!” She yelled out. James let out a huge huff before responding.

“I’M GONNA GET YOU OUT OF THERE, REGAN, JUST KEEP CALM.”  
He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply, everyone was at their vantage points. When he opened his eyes, he saw what he was looking for, he saw it crystal clear. Ogre stepped out of the cabin, Regan in his grip. A machete dangling from his hand, and then gently placed to her neck. His head cocked to the side, like he was waiting for someone to make the first move, but they knew how quick Ogre was, and knew her throat would be slit wide open before he could be dead on the ground.  
The war had begun, and Ogre wasn’t going down without a fight.

“Well...” Ogre smiled. “What a beautiful family reunion.”


	14. Finders Keepers

Ogre was standing face to face with 5 officers, and a very distraught father. He had them right where he wanted them. It was all a big game; Ogre had planned this from the beginning. He had done this before, many times even. He knew how to stay alive, and he knew how to make sure that everyone else around him suffered for eternity.

“Put them machete down, and talk to us like a man, tell us your motives, surrender, and you’ll come out of this alive, Ogre. Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.” James tried reasoning with him, but reasoning with someone as psychotic as Ogre was like telling an Orange to turn blue; impossible.

“Every kidnapping, every murder, every person that’s went missing in the last 5 years, and you all finally made it, over one bitch. I have to say, I’m pretty impressed.” Ogre smiled, holding the machete up to Regan’s neck and she dug her claws into his hand to try and pry him off her. Nothing worked.

“Let her go, don’t do this.” Giuseppe took a couple steps toward him, but Ogre didn’t budge, he needed to show them he wasn’t afraid, that’s how he always made it out alive, a tactic that’s yet to fail.

“We’re gonna play a game.”

“No, we’re not, you’re gonna hand over Regan and you’re gonna turn around, and put your fucking hands behind your back, hear me?” James aimed his gun right at Ogres’ head. He was done playing these twisted game of find the girl, the more he stood there and let Ogre walk all over them, the more he feared Regan wouldn’t make it out of the woods in one piece.

“That’s too easy, Officer, you know I’m a gamblin’ man.”

“You’re a sick man who needs mental help, that’s what you need. Fuck prison, I know a darker place to take you.”

“Turn back now, and maybe I won’t kill anymore of you.”

“Remember, there’s 5 of us, and only one of you.”

“Wrong!” Ogre laughed out loud, looking at Regan, before winking at her suspiciously. She looked out at the officers, at her father, tears streaming down her face, she was so weak, dirty, unable to speak, but she could tell by their faces that something was happening, something that wouldn’t turn out good at all. Ogre whipped her around to the front door to see John standing there, looking at good as he did the day they met, not weak, not on the verge of passing out, but clean and looked ready for a fight. He held a rifle in his hand, similar to the one Tom held close to his chest. Tom held his out, aiming it at John, who wouldn’t move. He looked down at Regan was who stunned at what she was seeing.

“John? What are you doing?” Her voice sounded distraught. She didn’t know what to think, why was he just standing there staring at her like he was ready to suck the soul right out of her. Was this his plan all along, to make her fall in love with him so she could trust him? It worked. He looked down at his rifle, stroking it with a side grin on his face, and his eyes glistening at how beautiful it looked in his hands, it was the first time in weeks he held a weapon in his hands, whatever it motives were, were unclear, but something in Regan’s mind knew that there was still a tension between Ogre and him that she couldn’t quite pinpoint.

“John, please, don’t do this. I trusted you, I told you things... That I can’t ever take back, don’t do this to me, please.” Regan’s calm tone sent a chilling feeling through John’s core. He had plans, but were they to hurt Regan, or to go behind Ogre’s back and save everyone? He stepped down onto the bottom step and smiled, giving Ogre the signal to continue talking.

“You thought he was gonna help you, didn’t you? You shared all your secrets with him, kissed him like he wanted you to, he held you like you two were the last ones on this earth and you believed every second of it, but you don’t know what you think you know, kid.” Ogre twisted her around to face him, inches from each other’s faces. James, Giuseppe, Tom and the rest held their weapons up ready to fire if things went wrong, but James held fire, wanting to press Ogre for more information.

“I’ll play your game if you play ours, that’s the deal.”  
Ogre and John exchanged awkward glances, but John shook his head in agreement.

“What did you have in mind?” John asked, but James wasn’t stupid, he wanted to know what they had in mind first.

“You tell me first, what’s your game?”  
Ogre smirked, trying to hold in any laughter he had left, and let John do the rest of the talking. John stepped down, standing next to Ogre, rifle clenched in his hand like his life depending on keeping it close to him at all times.

“We’ll let Regan go running through the woods to find a way out, we’ll give you a 10 second start to go after her, but we’re going after her too, if you find her, you can take her, if we find her… Well, finders’ keepers, right?”

“You’re out of your fuckin’ mind.” Giuseppe’s raspy voice from all the yelling finally caught up to him, John shot a nasty glance at him, before speaking again.

“If Regan stays and refuses to play this wonderful game of hide and seek, we kill all of you, and make her watch before killing her too.”

“Fuck you!” Regan tried releasing herself to smack John, but he acted oblivious to her existence.

“It’s a fair game, we’ll play yours, if you play ours, deal?” Ogre asked, a long pause from everyone, even James was lost for words, it was so quite you could hear the trees whistling from the wind. Finally, he spoke.

“Deal.”

“What?!” Giuseppe smacked his shoulder. Not understanding why, he would want to do such a crazy thing.

“This is the only way we can save her, remember, there’s only two of them.”

“Yeah, and 10 minutes ago there was one of them before Mr. Loverpants decided to switch sides again at the last second.” Giuseppe sighed, smacking his palm on his thigh. “Unbelievable.”

“We’re waiting Officers.” John looked down at his watch, frustrated with this constant waiting game.

“You have yourselves a deal, now it’s our turn. Our game is simple, we want answers, information. Why are you doing this? Why Regan?”

“Why not, Regan? Why anyone we ever took?” Ogre began, waiting for a follow up question.

“No, why Regan, meaning why are you keeping her alive this long, when you killed the others instantly?”

Ogre took a deep breath, but never letting them get to him, he held his head up high and grinned, that evil grin that made everyone’s skin crawl.

“She’s a pure blood, an innocent soul, who we wanted to turn vile and guilty before finishing her off.”

“What do you mean, vile and guilty?” James put his gun back in his holster and crossed his arms.

“What do you think we had John do here, we know a virgin when we see one…” John and Ogre laughed simultaneously. Tom had enough, he aimed his rifle up at the men before Ogre jolted his machete back up to Regan’s neck, making her squeal.

“NOT part of them game, Mr. Emmett, now put it down!” John screamed out, almost loud enough for the whole country to hear.

Regan closed her eyes, wondering how she got into this situation in the first place. If only she wasn’t jealous of her sister, and wasn’t a bum always having mommy and daddy doing everything for her, then maybe she would be home in Georgia, living a happier life without all this madness involved. People already died trying to save her, they wouldn’t get to go back to their families, and friends and laugh and have fun on their days off, those were going to haunt Regan’s mind for the rest of her life and it was all because of her jealous personality.

“Dad, I’m sorry for all this, this wouldn’t be happening if I had just listened to you and mom.” She cried out, hating herself every second they stood there.

“Don’t be sorry, honey. Let’s just worry about getting you home safe before there’s any apologies.”

“Might be her only time to apologize if we happen to find her first.” Ogre sighed out, happily awaiting their fun game of hide and seek: killers’ addition.

“I’m bored of these questions, time to play the real game.” Ogre threw the machete on the ground, John threw his rifle on the ground.

“We’ll search for her without the weapons, but you can bring yours.” Ogre spun Regan around to face him once more before kissing her hard on the mouth, her grunts were loud enough for everyone to hear, she pushed him off before he grabbed her wrist with tight force, so tight the pressure was agonizing.

“I’m gonna let her go, she’s gonna run into the woods like a good girl, you’re all gonna wait ten seconds, and then you can go find her, but another ten seconds, and we come find all of you. First group who finds Regan, well you already know.” Regan tried wiggling her way out of his grip, as he stared off at everyone, getting ready to count down until the game officially began. John gave Ogre a side eye, ready to do what he had to do.

“3…” He counted backwards. Everyone watching Regan, ready to play this game that James was regretting already. But he was willing to do whatever it took to keep Regan alive.

“2.” Everyone’s stomach’s dropped.

“1!”

_THUMP!_

Ogre dropped to the ground, everyone gasping, including Regan who was finally out of his grip. John stood over him, before spitting on his unconscious face. He looked up at Regan before placing his hand gently on her face. He had bashed Ogre’s head with the end of his rifle, his plan all along. He was never on Ogre’s side, just wanted him to think he was.

“I’m sorry everyone, this is partly my fault. I’m not on his side, but I’m not playing victim. Now he will wake up, fast. We’re not playing games, but he is. We need to go, and fast before he finds us, and I’m gonna help you get out of here… Alive.” He walked Regan over to her father, she hugged him tightly before sobbing in his arms, John kept his eye on Ogre while everyone gathered around Regan, hugging her and making sure she was okay, she was still weak, and dirty but that didn’t stop her from feeling more alive than she had in weeks.

“We have to go everyone, come on!” John signaled everyone into the neck of the woods, running onto the first trail they saw, John letting them go first, before looking back at Ogre, his hands moved a little, and John knew that meant he was waking up, and when you mess with Ogre, and turn things around on him, everything became a bloody mess, and he wasn’t going down until every last one of them was killed, Ogre knew how to make it out alive while everyone else laid in pool of their own blood.

But John wasn’t playing victim anymore, it was time to make a change, it was time to be the hero. He scurried off into the woods, while Ogre was still ready to play finders’ keepers, instead this time he would be finding more than just Regan, but John too.  
This will become the game of a life time for Ogre, and a plan of a lifetime for Regan and John. Ready, get set, go.


	15. The Only Way Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> My tumblr is @ineffable-wife

The woods almost felt creepier in the day time, I’ve never actually seen these woods, last time I went through here I was knocked out cold from whatever Ogre drugged me with. Everyone was right, it was big, bigger than what I was expecting. But I felt safe, finally. My dad was here, James and Giuseppe, they did exactly what they planned to do, rescue me. Of course, Ogre wasn’t dead and he would be looking for us at any moment, but knowing I had people here to protect me, made me feel warm inside.

“Regan…” James walked over to me, and I could see in his eyes he was still partially worried that we wouldn’t make it out, he knew Ogre was smart, as pathetic as he looked, his brain was 10 times faster than his actions, it was dangerous territory, Ogre’s mind.

“I’m okay, really. I don’t know exactly how to thank you, but just know I owe you big time, all this effort you put into finding me, I don’t know what I would have done had you guys not came.”  
“Why would I just leave you there to die? I knew from the moment we met there was something about you that just drew me in. You’re quite the mystery, Regan. But I like that about you.” My heart fluttered hearing James say that, because what was wrong with being a mystery? I was always the type of person to keep people guessing things about me, because what was the fun of knowing everything about me all at once?  
Our walking wasn’t slow in the slightest, all I wanted to do was take a break, after walking for what seemed like hours, but I knew we actually had only been walking for max 20 minutes, but as big as this place was, we’d be walking for 5 more hours. I looked behind me to see John scoping out the perimeter, looking out for Ogre in case he wanted to jump out and scare us. John had about four cops beside him for when we got out of the woods, they could arrest him, but I was going to do my best to try to get him to be let go, he might have been there when it all happened, but I knew John was a good person, and even when we met, that sarcastic tone in his voice, those deep eyes staring into my soul, I knew he wasn’t bad, I knew he was tricked by Ogre into being this monster that he and I knew he wasn’t. I saw him look over at me, this genuine smile on his face, I could tell he felt free at last, it made me happy knowing that not only was I saved, but in a big way, so was he. Saved from Ogre’s bullshit, saved from all the things he put John through, he had been around Ogre much longer than I have, I couldn’t imagine the things he saw and had to be put through just to survive.  
Ring Ring Ring

“It’s Ahniah.” James spoke in a low voice, he sighed and answered it before immediately handing me the phone, I was so eager to let her know I was okay I didn’t even let her talk.

“Ahniah, it’s me. I’m okay, they got me out!” I almost sobbed, still comprehending that I made it out of there alive.

“I’m so happy to hear that, I knew you’d make it out of there, and I always had faith in Giuseppe and James to help you, I know how much you mean to James, even if you only met for a brief time, he has a thing for scoping out amazing people.” I could hear Ahniah’s chuckles, and I could feel her smiling through the phone, she was a great friend with a big heart, that’s another thing that made this journey back home so important, so I could hug Ahniah and start over with a new life and amazing people to share it with.  
We came to a halt, everyone had slowed down and then eventually just stopped all together. John thought he heard rustling in the bushes and wanted to investigate, but everyone else was still a little edgy around John, like he still had an objective, maybe wanting to go back to help Ogre, but I knew better. John was the good guy, he hit Ogre in the back of the head with a rifle for fuck sake.

“I don’t know about that one, he might be tricking us.” I could hear Giuseppe whispering to James, I tried not to interfere.

“Yeah but Regan seems to trust him, so I say we just keep an eye on him until we know for sure what his motives are.”

“Motives?” I couldn’t help it, I had to jump in. “What exactly do you think he’s gonna do, kill us all? He’s unarmed.”

“Doesn’t mean he and Ogre didn’t plan this, I mean he acted like he was on his side than magically decided to knock him out cold to join us. Maybe this was their plot. Ogre may need John to be as close to you as possible to lure him to us.”

“Stop!” I shouted out, tired of all this craziness. “For once, things like this can happen. It doesn’t always have to happen in books or movies, sometimes the bad guys can turn good, have some faith in him.”

“Regan, why are you sticking up for this guy? Remember, he is 50% of why you were put in this situation.” James stopped me, and put his hand on my shoulder. I knew he was only trying to help but something in me didn’t want to hear it. “It’s almost as if you actually have feelings for this guy.”

“And if I do?” I folded my arms, my eyes spoke of anger but I tried understanding where James was coming from, before I got kidnapped, we were supposed to go on a date, but things changed, feelings changed, and James needed to know that.

“Then that would be bad, because I’m still going to arrest him, Regan. At least until I get some honest answers about why he did what he did, whether he started changing sides or not.”

“So did you just rescue me because you thought we would be together, was this your pants talking, or was this actually your heart, ‘cos honestly who fuckin’ knows?” I couldn’t believe I had said that, but part of me was genuinely curious. It was like he was angry about me not liking him anymore, when I had just been kidnapped, and rescued, who would have thought this conversation would escalate.  
Giuseppe looked at James and at me, his jaw dropped to the floor, maybe I over spoke. But can’t take it back now.

“Regan, don’t say that!” I heard my dad yell out from ahead of me, turning around to face me, inches away from my face, what a familiar sight, my dad being pissed off at me for something I said, maybe nothing had changed.

“No, Tom I get it. Regan, this isn’t about me liking you, this is about me doing my god damn job.” I could tell James was trying to keep his composure, but I also knew he wasn’t fooling anyone, he wasn’t fooling himself, that’s for damn sure.  
I continued walking, trying not to pay any more attention to John, or anyone else giving me awkward glares, and started speaking again, not worried about what I might say next, because this was who I was now, after all I had been through.

“I lived my entire life looking at the bad, and not seeing the good. I was always jealous of my sister, she had everything that I didn’t. Maybe ‘cos I didn’t work hard enough, which obviously was true, but I still made my way in life without being a bum on the streets. I picked fights with my parents constantly, that was bad. But for once, I wanna see the good in people, in myself. I can’t keep going on knowing that someone who helped me is gonna spend the rest of their lives in jail when he can change himself too.”  
James wanted to speak, but something held him back, maybe it was the anger from me wanting to let him go free instead of locking him up, but he also knew I wouldn’t take locking him up as an answer if he wanted anything more to do with me. I know, I may sound horrible when I say those words, but I wanted a fresh start, I wanted to see good, not red all the time.  
Soon after our intense conversation, everyone grew quiet, the only sounds were those of our feet stepping over branches and the cracking of leaves that fell off the dead trees. James could tell we were getting closer to finding an exit, he mentioned seeing blood stains on some of the trees on his way to find me, I could see what he meant. It was terrifying.

“I wonder if that’s my blood, when he dragged me in here, I know I must’ve been bleeding, he hit me on the head at one point. Could be mine, could be his own…”  
“It being his own sounds more up his alley, he is a fuckin’ nut.” Giuseppe said, rolling his eyes, I couldn’t help but laugh.

_CRACKLE_

Everyone jumped out of their skin. That didn’t sound like the wind brushing up against the trees, no. It sounded like someone was hiding, like someone was watching us. It took a lot for me to be scared at this point, but Ogre horrified me. His face was sunk in, he aged horribly. He already looked like he was in his 50s, but the way he was living out here, who really knew. He always wore black clothes, black boots, and he always wore this faded out black cap that he never took off, no matter what. But what caught me was his makeup, he wore eyeliner, and black nail polish. He was your typical goth guy, but a try hard at best.

“Look, if he tries to hurt Regan, or anyone, I’ll deal with it. Please, I have unfinished business with Ogre, I won’t let him hurt anyone. If anything, he can hurt me before I let him touch her.” I heard John whispering to Giuseppe, who then looked to James for confirmation. James didn’t know what to say, instead he looked over at me like he was waiting for me to say something. I also didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want John putting himself in anymore danger, but maybe this is what Ogre wanted, we had to come up with a plan to counter back his attacks.

“Us being scared is exactly what he wants. He’s expecting us to fight back, he’s expecting you all to guard me, so when he arrives, you’re vulnerable from protecting me you won’t be able to see him charging after someone. We need to work together and keep moving, or we’ll never make it out of here.” I saw James smiling at me after I said that, he looked proud, but I knew well enough from the weeks of being in his trap that Ogre is a smart man, but not as smart as me.  
I walked up ahead of everyone, just a little, I needed everyone behind me, but ahead of me was John, holding a pocketknife in his hand, clenching it. I looked around to see if Ogre had left any clues, but I felt hopeless, would Ogre leave anything in the day time, or is he strictly a night time person? Was he himself vulnerable? It would be tricky to hide during the day, especially when he sticks out the way he does, it’s hard to miss him. I looked down at the ground, little blood spots caught my eye here and there, but it was nothing out of the ordinary, until myself and everyone behind me heard John calling out from farther up ahead.

“Hey! Get back here!”  
We all ran to him, as fast as we could, he had found Ogre, and we could hear John rushing after someone, which made it harder for us to catch up to him.

“Regan stay back don’t go too far ahead of us!” I heard my dad yelling out from behind me, but my adrenaline was kicking in like crazy, I wanted to bash the head in of the man who fucked my life up, who hurt me, abused me, raped me, stared into my soul like he was about to eat it. I wanted it to end, I wanted this nightmare to be over, this ended now.  
I stopped and let everyone catch up to me, the police officers and my father had to stop a take breath from running so fast, but I felt I could run five more miles, we had lost John, and who knew if he had gotten a hold of Ogre or not, or maybe Ogre got a hold of him first. All I knew was that my blood was boiling, and I had no idea what was about to happen next. I closed my eyes and put my hands on my hips, trying to think of a way to end this and make it out of the woods alive, but nothing came to mind. James tried comforting me, along with Giuseppe, while the other police officers continued up ahead in search of Ogre and John.

“Would you charge John for murder if he killed Ogre?” I asked James, as he put his arm around my waist, trying to calm me down, it felt good to be comforted by someone for the moment.

“I don’t know; I mean at this point if anyone killed Ogre it would be because of self-defense. He’s out here trying to kill you, us.” I nodded at that, but then again, John was already in a heaping pile of shit, I still needed a way to get through to James to let him go free. I had plans…  
It was me, Giuseppe, James, and my father. We stood in a circle waiting for the other policemen to come back with either John, or with bad news. Something to me didn’t feel right though, I wondered whether the policemen were even coming back, I wondered if Ogre got a hold of them. He had skills of killing multiple men at once, so John told me.

“We stay put until they return, we don’t wanna risk getting caught in something we can’t get out of, trust me. I’ve put myself in dangerous situations before, but this… This is bad.” James spoke low enough for only us to hear. Giuseppe nodded, we all did. We had no choice but to agree, we couldn’t risk being caught in a trap. The other men might have gotten themselves into quite the sticky situation. “I hope the other officers find their way back here, even walking for 2 minutes can get you lost.” He continued.  
I walked around a couple trees, trying to take my mind off of everything, it was a waiting game that I was getting really bored with, and I was starting to worry. I looked back at James, Giuseppe, and my father, who were all sitting under a big tree with blood splattered on it. I looked at it before my eyes widened, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

_WHEN YOU SEE IT, HIDE YOUR LIFE. IT HAS BEGUN. WATCH OUT FOR THE ARROWS._

“Shit!” I shouted. The three stood up before a familiar sound darted at James’ leg at full speed.

“Ah!” I could hear James’ voice crack from the agonizing pain. I hid behind the trees, observing. I couldn’t believe that this was happening, I wanted to run to help him, but something compelled me from doing so. I had to hide to save myself. I just hoped they could run for safety too.

“Fuck! Where did that come from!” James held his leg, blood was gushing out like a waterfall, who knew your leg carried so much blood. Giuseppe and my father tried putting pressure on his leg, but another arrow darted out, I jumped, covering my eyes.

“Giuseppe!” James shouted out, but it was too late, another arrow had shot right in Giuseppe’s back, he fell to the ground, weeping, still alive, but the look on his face spoke death, he couldn’t even speak, he couldn’t cry, he just wept. The pain stopped from being able to talk. James couldn’t barely move, but managed to slide his way to Giuseppe to access the problem, grabbing onto the arrow but not pulling it out, it barely missed his spine, it would have killed him instantly had it been shot directly into his spine. What was Ogre doing? Why was he keeping them alive? I looked over at my dad, his eyes watery, staring off into the distance, and I wondered what it was he was staring at. I couldn’t tell from my hiding spot, but something caught his attention, he looked scared. I didn’t know what to do, I wanted to run to him, to all of them, but I couldn’t, I had to save myself first, as selfish as it sounded, I had been through too much to get killed halfway to my escape place.  
Soon, I could see a shadow going towards my father, my hand covered my mouth as tears fell from my face, I was trying to keep calm, but my eyes did whatever they wanted to, I couldn’t help it.

“Don’t you do it asshole! Don’t!” I heard James yelling, someone was there, was it Ogre, or was it John even? Did he turn on us again? I wanted to see. I tip toed from behind the tree, and moved over to huddle near a tall bush, but I could see clearer now. My mouth dropped. It was Ogre, standing there with a crossbow pointed at my dad’s head.

“Don’t!” I jumped out from the bush, Ogre jolting his head over to me, grinning from ear to ear. I held my mouth, hoping that he wouldn’t do what I knew he wanted to do, but something inside of me knew that what Ogre wanted the most was to see me in pain, physically, but more sadistically, emotionally as well. “Please, not my dad. Take me instead, you don’t have to hurt him.” I didn’t know how else to beg him, but to be straight forward, I hoped John would find us and get him before he could hurt anyone else, but I knew putting myself in front of him was dangerous, but my dad meant to the world to me, and I wasn’t about to let Ogre get away with it.

“Remember what I said, Regan?” Ogre spoke. Making everyone’s skin crawl. My eyes went over to James, and Giuseppe, James holding on to Giuseppe who was clinging to life, and my dad who was staring at the arrow pointed to his head, he tried remaining calm but I could tell he was fearing for his life. “When I said watching you beg was my ultimate pleasure?”

“Honey it’s okay, I love you.” I heard my dad sob, I couldn’t contain myself anymore, I dropped to my knees and cried. I couldn’t do it anymore, the emotional pain was too much, I held it in for so long that it finally caught up to me. I didn’t know what to do anymore, I don’t think anyone did, we were in the middle of a trap, and this time, we couldn’t get out.

“Dad…” I looked at him. My eyes were blood shot from the crying. “I love you, dad.” I spoke out, before –

_THUNK_

“No!” James, astounded at what he just saw. But what I saw in my eyes, was even worse. My dad laid there dead, an arrow in his forehead, blood dripping little by little but creating a puddle next to his face. His eyes were still open, staring directly at me. My mouth was open but I didn’t know what to say, I started heaving. Until Ogre dropped his crossbow and placed his hands in his pockets, now facing me. I was shaking but managed to stand up somehow.

“DON’T HURT HER YOU COCKSUCKER.” Giuseppe’s raspy voice called out, I almost felt bad. I crossed my arms and faced Ogre, now it was my turn to have some fun.

“I would have killed them all, but John made it a point to keep them alive until we had a chance to speak one on one.” Ogre spoke in a normal voice, first time I ever heard him speak normally since I’ve known him, but his words meant nothing to me, I had plans, and boy was he a big part of it.

“So you killed him, big fuckin’ deal.” I smiled. James and Giuseppe looked up at me in fear, not knowing what was going on.

“Regan, what are you talking about, he just killed your dad, how is that not a big deal?” James asked, wondering what was happening, but he wasn’t my focus at the moment, only Ogre.

“You think John was really on your side, girl? He never was, only on my side. He would be stupid to choose between us, he knows what’s right, and knows what needs to be buried in the dirt.” Ogre looked over at the two men on the ground, hurt and confused, I tried not looking at them, I only wanted my sights on Ogre. This was the plan, this was the only plan I knew, and I was sticking to it.

“Yeah, buried in the dirt alright. That’s why John dug a grave for you right up ahead, why don’t you take a look?” My side smirk on point, as he looked at me questionably before starting to turn around, slowly. James and Giuseppe looked more confused, but knew something was about to go down, they saw something surprising standing behind Ogre, and James knew exactly what was about to happen, it all made sense to him now.  
Ogre turned around and there stood in front of him, John. Rifle aimed right at Ogre’s face.

“It’s over… Nivek. Time to end this, now.”

“You played me this whole time! You really are choosing the cunt over me! Why’d you have me kill her father then?!” He asked, not knowing what to do, but this time, he was trapped, and we had him right where we wanted him.

“She wanted you to kill him. Don’t you get it? Your plan backfired the moment you dragged Regan out of the cabin. We had already made plans, no one knew except us.”  
I looked over at James, who was dumbfounded, I rolled my eyes, I couldn’t believe he hadn’t figured it out.

“She asked me to play along with your game. She wanted me to tell you to kill him. Honestly I would have done it myself but I needed those two idiots over there to believe I was on their side, she asked me to ask you to do it. Pretty easy, right?”  
Ogre turned around and looked at me, almost impressed. But James and Giuseppe were not.

“What you fucking planned to have us killed!? REGAN!” James tried standing up, I walked over to him and pushed him back on the ground, stepping on his leg wound, making him howl in pain.

“Don’t fuckin’ move.” I grunted in his ear before walking up to John, rubbing his shoulder gently.

“So why are you aiming that on me, if she’s as skilled at this as you point out, she could join us.”  
I busted out laughing. I couldn’t keep a straight face at those words.

“Fuck no, no one’s joining you, Ogre. You’re going into that grave right there, you’re done.”  
I could hear James pleading with me, I didn’t feel bad for him at all and it felt fucking amazing, this plan was my way and John’s way of surviving, without John getting locked up, it was the only way.

“If you’re gonna kill Ogre, why are you going against us, we want the same outcome as you.”

“No.” I began. “You wanna lock John up, and guess what, asshole?” I knelt down in front of him, tears falling from his face. “Not happening.”

_BANG!_

Ogre dropped to the ground, the echo from the gun shot still roaming through the woods, but still not loud enough for anyone else to hear. It just felt so right. Watching him die was the best feeling I’ve felt in a long while. I stroked James’ cheek, but his hand pushed mine away with force. My smile went away but I knew it was only because he was angry and confused.

“You’ll get over it.” I sighed before getting up and walking to John, our hands connecting with each other’s. “THIS IS MY LIFE; IT WAS MEANT TO BE THIS WAY JAMES.” I sobbed, but not because I felt bad for him, but because no one understood what it was like being me, being the outcast, no one understood me, except John, he made me feel loved and happy, this was my life now, and I intended on living it my way. I only learned from the best.  
I looked at Ogre’s lifeless body, before blowing him a kiss. John walked over to James and Giuseppe, before putting a bullet in both of their heads. Damn that felt so good to watch. It was all over, the search was over, the mad man was put down, life could go back to normal, at least our version of normal. I watched John drag Ogre’s body to the grave he dug and threw him in there like rotten meat, after all… That’s exactly what he would become.  
He took my hand afterwards and began walking me out of the woods, passing the dead bodies of the policemen who went searching for them earlier.

“Your work, or his?”

“Both.” He kissed me gently as we made our way out of these god damn woods.

_._

**THE NEXT DAY**

Regan and John laid in bed, Regan’s bed. After exiting the woods, they went back to Regan’s home, as if she never left, and began their new lives together. Everything felt so peaceful. They woke up next to each other, kissing softly, so happy together, knowing no one was coming after them anymore.

“I’ll make coffee.” John got up and stretched before walking downstairs into the kitchen. Regan got up and put her robe on before she heard a knock on her front door. She hustled downstairs, to see John standing there in hesitation. But Regan opened the door anyway. Standing there was Ahniah, who looked frantic.

“Oh, Ahniah! Hi!” Regan smiled, hugging her dearly.

“Hi Regan I’m so happy to see you’re okay!” She sighed in relief. “I’ve been trying to look for Giuseppe and John, but they never came back last night after you returned, did they stay here?”

“No!” Regan fake smiled. John hid behind the counter, hoping Ahniah wouldn’t see him. He listened in carefully.

“Oh, well do you know where they could be, by chance?”

“You know what, I think they went back in the woods to make sure nothing else is out there, you can go check, they aren’t far, just call their names, and they’ll come runnin’.” Regan suggested, Ahniah nodded her head happily and left to head to the woods.  
John walked up to Regan and put his arm around her. “I’ll take care of her in a moment, for now I want this.” He closed his eyes and smiled before kissing Regan once more.

What a life it was. What a life indeed.

**Author's Note:**

> Just testing the waters for a story I wrote about a year ago, it's an original piece, I was really proud I actually managed to finish a story, and it's 15 chapters long so we'll see how it goes! If you are reading this, thanks for coming over to the original works place, I appreciate it. :)
> 
> (God Im so sorry for how horribly this was written lmao. I promise Stockholm Sweet is written better. I learned a lot in 3 years).


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